Enhancing Confidence in Microplastic Spectral Identification via Conformal Prediction.

Microplastics are an emerging pollutant of concern, with environmental observations recorded across the world. Identifying the type of microplastic is challenging due to spectral similarities among the most common polymers, necessitating methods that can confidently distinguish plastic identities. In practice, a researcher chooses the reference vibrational spectrum that is most like the unknown spectrum, where the likeness between the two spectra is expressed numerically as the hit quality index (HQI).

Protocol for Evaluating Anion Exchange Membranes for Nonaqueous Redox Flow Batteries.

Nonaqueous redox flow batteries often suffer from reduced battery lifetime and decreased coulombic efficiency due to crossover of the redox-active species through the membrane. One method to mitigate this undesired crossover is to judiciously choose a membrane based on several criteria: swelling and structural integrity, size and charge of redox active species, and ionic conductivity. Most research to date has focused on reducing crossover by synthesizing modified redox-active molecules and/or new membranes.

Revisiting poly(vinyl chloride) reactivity in the context of chemical recycling.

Poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC) is one of the highest production volume polymers due to its many applications, and it is one of the least recycled due to its chemical structure and frequent formulation with additives. Developing efficient PVC recycling techniques would enable PVC waste to be reused or repurposed in other processes. Within this context, the literature on PVC modification offers considerable insight into versatile reaction pathways, potentially inspiring new approaches for repurposing PVC waste into value-added products.

Substituent Impact on Quinoxaline Performance and Degradation in Redox Flow Batteries.

Aqueous redox flow batteries (RFBs) are attractive candidates for low-cost, grid-scale storage of energy from renewable sources. Quinoxaline derivatives represent a promising but underexplored class of charge-storing materials on account of poor chemical stability in prior studies (with capacity fade rates >20%/day). Here, we establish that 2,3-dimethylquinoxaline-6-carboxylic acid (DMeQUIC) is vulnerable to tautomerization in its reduced form under alkaline conditions.