Platinum catalysts Fermi energy

In the electron transfer theories discussed so far, the metal has been treated as a structureless donor or acceptor of electrons—its electronic structure has not been considered. Mathematically, this view is expressed in the wide band approximation, in which A is considered as independent of the electronic energy e. For the. sp-metals, which near the Fermi level have just a wide, stmctureless band composed of. s- and p-states, this approximation is justified. However, these metals are generally bad catalysts for example, the hydrogen oxidation reaction proceeds very slowly on all. sp-metals, but rapidly on transition metals such as platinum and palladium [Trasatti, 1977]. Therefore, a theory of electrocatalysis must abandon the wide band approximation, and take account of the details of the electronic structure of the metal near the Fermi level [Santos and Schmickler, 2007a, b, c Santos and Schmickler, 2006]. 

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