Funnel-Shaped Floating Vessel Oil Skimmer with Joule Heating Sorption Functionality.

Floating vessel-type oil collecting devices based on sorbent materials present potential solutions to oil spill cleanup that require a massive amount of sorbent material and manual labor. Additionally, continuous oil extraction from these devices presents opportunities for highly energy-efficient oil skimmers that use gravity as the oil/water separation mechanism. Herein, a sorbent-based oil skimmer (SOS) is developed with a novel funnel-shaped sorbent and vessel design for efficient and continuous extraction of various oils from the water surface.

PDMS Sponges with Embedded Carbon Nanotubes as Piezoresistive Sensors for Human Motion Detection.

Porous piezoresistive sensors offer promising flexible sensing functionality, such as human joint motion detection and gesture identification. Herein, a facile fabrication method is developed using a microwave-based rapid porogen removal technique for the manufacturing of porous nanocomposite sponges consisting of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) and well-dispersed carbon nanotubes (CNTs). The porogen amounts and CNT loadings are varied to tailor the porosity and electrical properties of the porous sensors.

Rapid Microwave Polymerization of Porous Nanocomposites with Piezoresistive Sensing Function.

In this paper, polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) and multi-walled carbon nanotube (MWCNT) nanocomposites with piezoresistive sensing function were fabricated using microwave irradiation. The effects of precuring time on the mechanical and electrical properties of nanocomposites were investigated. The increased viscosity and possible nanofiller re-agglomeration during the precuring process caused decreased microwave absorption, resulting in extended curing times, and decreased porosity and electrical conductivity in the cured nanocomposites.

Enhanced Electrical Conductivity of Carbon Nanotube-Based Elastomer Nanocomposites Prepared by Microwave Curing.

Nanocomposites consisting of polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) and well-dispersed carbon nanotubes (CNT) can be cured by microwave radiation within a minute, forming a conductive network within the cured materials. Microwave irradiation delivers energy directly to the inner core of the nanocomposites by heating CNTs and initiating rapid polymerization of the elastomer. In this paper, nanocomposites were fabricated with CNT loadings between 0.