AFM and XRD Analysis of Lanthanum Strontium Cobalt Thin Film Fabricated Using Sol-Gel Dip Coating Method

Abstract

Nowadays, solid oxide fuel cells (SOFC) have drawn expanding consideration as an option framework for little scale mobile power generation. Therefore, in order to get an economic yet high performance SOFC, the operation temperature was lowered to 600’C range. In this attempt, Lanthanum Strontium Cobalt (LSC) was used as a cathode material. The performance of Lanthanum Strontium Cobalt (LSC) also depends on the different thickness of LSC cathode. The thickness were prepared from one to five layer with constant temperature at 600 °C. The Lanthanum Strontium Cobalt (LSC) was belong to ABO₃ perovskite oxide family. The perovskite was used to improve the cell design. Perovskite materials have been widely used as cathode materials in SOFCs due to high oxygen ionic conductivity and as ion-transport membranes for oxygen separation and production. Dip coating method was used to fabricate a porous structure of LSC cathode. The suspensions was prepared by sol-gel dip coating. The sol-gel precursor was prepared by mixing ethanol, LSC powder and polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) as a ceramic binder. The crystalline structure was analyse using X-Ray Diffraction and the morphological structure was analyse by using Atomic Force Microscope. Therefore the grain size and crystallization of Lanthanum Strontium Cobalt (LSC) was discuss.