Characterization Methods for Components and Materials

Abstract This chapter gives a general view of various spectroscopic and electron microscopic techniques that are common and increasingly used for the physiochemical characterization of fuel cell materials. The measuring principle of the X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), the scanning electron microscopy (SEM), the transmission electron microscopy (TEM), the atomic force microscopy (AFM), the infrared (IR) spectroscopy, and the Raman spectroscopy method are simplified and described by a selected example for each characterization method. The gained insights from the structure, morphology, and surface analyses of individual fuel cell components (e.g., membrane, catalyst, support material, etc.) are used for performance improvement to drastically enhance the power of the respective fuel cell system.