The operation of polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM)-based fuel cells involves numerous physicochemical processes and components actively governing its function and, among them, gas transport phenomena and gas diffusion layer (GDL) are noteworthy, and the present paper provides a comprehensive assessment on gas diffusion mechanism, geometry of GDL components and related modelling studies involved in GDL fabrication. The impact of GDL on diffusion of reactants, water management and the transport of ions has also been systematically dealt.

Comprehensive numerical simulation model was developed to describe the structural changes in the iron ore sintering bed by using the discrete element method (DEM). The heat wave propagation through the sintering bed was incorporated by combining the solutions of the various reaction rates and gas-granule heat transfer with the calculation of the granule movement by DEM. Simulations were conducted under different conditions, i.e., different carbon content and melting temperature of the granules. Results show that both carbon content and melting temperature of the granule influence the final structure of the sintering bed. The obtained structural change of the sintering bed show that the proposed model is a potential tool to analyse the agglomeration phenomena occurring in the iron ore sintering process under various conditions.

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The conventional gas diffusion layer (GDL) of polymer electrolyte membrane (PEM) fuel cells incorporates a carbon-based substrate, which suffers from electrochemical oxidation as well as mechanical degradation, resulting in reduced durability and performance. In addition, it involves a complex manufacturing process to produce it. The proposed technique aims to resolve both these issues by an advanced 3D printing technique, namely selective laser sintering (SLS). In the proposed work, polyamide (PA) is used as the base powder and titanium metal powder is added at an optimised level to enhance the electrical conductivity, thermal, and mechanical properties. The application of selective laser sintering to fabricate a robust gas diffusion substrate for PEM fuel cell applications is quite novel and is attempted here for the first time.

The present paper proposes a simple yet effective technique to improve the performance of a practical PEM fuel cell system by tuning the two key operating parameters based on the expert’s rules derived from the literature. The fuzzy rule base is designed to optimally control the temperature and humidification of the two critical parameters governing the fuel cell system performance and dynamics. The modelling of the proposed methodology is presented through the Matlab/fuzzy logic toolbox.

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Gas Diffusion Layer (GDL) is a versatile component of the PEM fuel cell stack and the well-known gas diffusion substrates used in the PEM fuel cell stack incorporates the carbon fiber based GDLs which suffers from limitations due to degradation and carbon oxidation. The present paper describes the novel integrated approach using 3D printed microfabrication technology to develop a durable, cheap and conductive gas diffusion material. Mechanical and Electrical characterization of the proposed material is performed which evidently indicates that the proposed material can be a promising candidate for gas diffusion layer in future.

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