Hydrothermal Synthesis of Rare-Earth Modified Titania: Influence on Phase Composition, Optical Properties, and Photocatalytic Activity.

In order to expand the use of titania indoor as well as to increase its overall performance, narrowing the band gap is one of the possibilities to achieve this. Modifying with rare earths (REs) has been relatively unexplored, especially the modification of rutile with rare earth cations. The aim of this study was to find the influence of the modification of TiO₂ with rare earths on its structural, optical, morphological, and photocatalytic properties.

A review of plasma-assisted catalytic conversion of gaseous carbon dioxide and methane into value-added platform chemicals and fuels.

CO and CH contribute to greenhouse gas emissions, while the production of industrial base chemicals from natural gas resources is emerging as well. Such conversion processes, however, are energy-intensive and introducing a renewable and sustainable electric activation seems optimal, at least for intermediate-scale modular operation. The review thus analyses such valorisation by plasma reactor technologies and heterogeneous catalysis application, largely into higher hydrocarbon molecules, that is ethane, ethylene, acetylene, propane, , and organic oxygenated compounds, methanol, formaldehyde, formic acid and dimethyl ether.

Smallest Bimetallic CoPt Superparamagnetic Nanoparticles.

We present for the first time a nonaqueous sol-gel route to produce ultrasmall (<2 nm) magnetic bimetallic CoPt nanoparticles (NPs). The one-pot procedure is carried out at low temperature (180 °C) using benzyl alcohol, acting as both reducing agent and solvent. The highly monodisperse CoPt NPs were investigated with innovative advanced X-ray methods (whole powder pattern modeling), HR-STEM, XPS, and SQUID magnetometry.

Selective Plasma Etching of Polymeric Substrates for Advanced Applications.

In today's nanoworld, there is a strong need to manipulate and process materials on an atom-by-atom scale with new tools such as reactive plasma, which in some states enables high selectivity of interaction between plasma species and materials. These interactions first involve preferential interactions with precise bonds in materials and later cause etching. This typically occurs based on material stability, which leads to preferential etching of one material over other.