Intraparticle sorption and desorption of antibiotics.

Intraparticle domains are the critical locations for storing contaminants and retarding contaminant transport in subsurface environments. While the kinetics and extent of antibiotics sorption and desorption in subsurface materials have been extensively studied, their behaviors in intraparticle domains have not been well understood. This study investigated the sorption and desorption of antibiotics (ATs) in the intraparticle domains using quartz grains and clay, and antibiotic tetracycline (TC) and levofloxacin (LEV) as examples that are commonly present in groundwater systems.

Facile low-temperature supercritical carbonization method to prepare high-loading nickel single atom catalysts for efficient photodegradation of tetracycline.

Environmental photocatalysis is a promising technology for treating antibiotics in wastewater. In this study, a supercritical carbonization method was developed to synthesize a single-atom photocatalyst with a high loading of Ni (above 5 wt.%) anchored on a carbon-nitrogen-silicate substrate for the efficient photodegradation of a ubiquitous environmental contaminant of tetracycline (TC).

Iterative Approach of Experiment-Machine Learning for Efficient Optimization of Environmental Catalysts: An Example of NO Selective Reduction Catalysts.

An iterative approach between machine learning (ML) and laboratory experiments was developed to accelerate the design and synthesis of environmental catalysts (ECs) using selective catalytic reduction (SCR) of nitrogen oxides (NO) as an example. The main steps in the approach include training a ML model using the relevant data collected from the literature, screening candidate catalysts from the trained model, experimentally synthesizing and characterizing the candidates, updating the ML model by incorporating the new experimental results, and screening promising catalysts again with the updated model. This process is iterated with a goal to obtain an optimized catalyst.

Coupled dynamics of As-containing ferrihydrite transformation and As desorption/re-adsorption in presence of sulfide.

This study investigated the coupled dynamics of the redox transformation of arsenic-containing ferrihydrite, and arsenate desorption and re-adsorption in presence of sulfide. Batch experiments, various microscopic and spectroscopic analyses collectively revealed that electrons from sulfide competitively transferred to ferrihydrite and no arsenate was reduced. The reductive dissolution of ferrihydrite by sulfide led to the quick formation of FeS that competitively decreased the availability of sulfide for its subsequent reduction of ferrihydrite.

Bifunctional acid-base mesoporous silica@aqueous miscible organic-layered double hydroxides.

A facile method for the synthesis of a series of mesoporous silica nanoporous (MSN) aqueous miscible organic layered double hydroxide core@shell nanocomposites using MCM-41, Al-MCM-41, SBA-15, and MCM-48 as the core is reported. These materials exhibit hierarchical morphologies with high surface areas and good porosity. Chemically, these materials offer controllable bifunctional basicity and acidity.

Dendritic silica@aqueous miscible organic-layered double hydroxide hybrids.

We present the synthesis of a series of hierarchical Silica@Layered Double Hydroxide (SiO@LDH) core@shell hybrid materials that have been post-treated using the Aqueous Miscible Organic Solvent Treatment (AMOST) method. The Silica@Aqueous Miscible Organic-Layered Double Hydroxide (SiO@AMO-LDH) hybrids exhibit composition flexibility with radially oriented AMO-MgAl-CO-LDH nanosheets resulting in a new dendritic morphology.