Direct methanol fuel cells: A database-driven design procedure

► We present a model for testing the feasibility of direct methanol fuel cell systems applied in portable electronic devices in early phases of the design process. ► This model is an algorithm which automates the design of a DMFC power system by choosing and designing components and combining them into on optimized design. ► The model is implemented in Mathematica and evaluates the chosen component set by minimizing an objective function F(D) which is a function of three properties: volume, weight and costs. ► A case study is presented to test the working of the algorithm.