Abstract
Until now, perfluorinated proton exchange membrane (PEM) has been widely used as the electrolyte for PEMFC. As long as the perfluorinated OEM is used for the electrolyte, both the cell performance and durability of OEMFC strongly depends on the water content in its electrolyte, since the high conductivity of electrolyte is presented only at the sufficient hydrated state. On the other hand, pre-humidification of fuel and oxidant gases complicates the PEMFC system and prevents it from cost reduction. Therefore, in order to achieve simultaneously the high performance, durability and cost reduction of PEMFC, it is thought to be a best way that both the anode and cathode catalyst layers will be highly humidified only by the water produced through an electrode reaction without pre-humidification of fuel and oxidant gases. Although the management of the vapor permeation rate through gas diffusion layers will be most effective for such a self-humidified PEMFC, it isn't so easy to achieve it in the wide range of current density.
