SIMULATION STUDY OF BIONIC CHANNEL-INSPIRED OF PROTON EXCHANGE MEMBRANE FUEL CELL BASED ON NEURON

Wang Ke; Zhang Shuanyang; Xu Hongtao; Liu Shun; Mao Yijun

doi:10.19912/j.0254-0096.tynxb.2022-0571

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Acta Energiae Solaris Sinica ›› 2022, Vol. 43 ›› Issue (6) : 454-459. DOI: 10.19912/j.0254-0096.tynxb.2022-0571

SIMULATION STUDY OF BIONIC CHANNEL-INSPIRED OF PROTON EXCHANGE MEMBRANE FUEL CELL BASED ON NEURON

Wang Ke, Zhang Shuanyang, Xu Hongtao, Liu Shun, Mao Yijun

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Abstract

The flow field design of the proton exchange membrane fuel cell has a significant influence on the flow and pressure drop of the reaction gas. Inspired by the structure of the neural cell, a novel bio-inspired flow channel design is proposed, which takes account of the advantages of radial and bionic flow channels in pressure drop and the uniformity of gas distribution. The COMSOL software is adopted to investigate the effects of the flow channels with different number of branches from 2 to 9 on the polarization curve, cathode oxygen concentration, water concentration distribution and pressure drop of the proton exchange membrane fuel cell. The results show that with the increase in the number of branches, the output performance of the proton exchange membrane fuel cell is gradually improved, and the maximum power density of the flow channel with 9 branches is 0.32 W/cm², which is 146.15% higher than that of the flow channel with 2 branches. Increasing the number of branches also improves the uniformity of oxygen concentration distribution, the concentration of oxygen at the interface between the gas diffusion layer and the catalyst layer increases from 0.44 mol/m³ to 1.42 mol/m³, and the oxygen non-uniformity decreases from 2.13 to 0.90, respectively. The increase in the number of branches also improves the performance of water management in the curved channel. In addition, as the number of branches increase from 2 to 9, the pressure drop of the channel is reduced from 38.57 Pa to 4.47 Pa, and the output power of the cell increases from 0.40 W to 1.56 W.

Key words

proton exchange membrane fuel cell / numerical simulation / flow field / bionics / neuron

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Wang Ke, Zhang Shuanyang, Xu Hongtao, Liu Shun, Mao Yijun. SIMULATION STUDY OF BIONIC CHANNEL-INSPIRED OF PROTON EXCHANGE MEMBRANE FUEL CELL BASED ON NEURON[J]. Acta Energiae Solaris Sinica. 2022, 43(6): 454-459 https://doi.org/10.19912/j.0254-0096.tynxb.2022-0571

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