Dipole Moment and Built-In Polarization Electric Field Induced by Oxygen Vacancies in BiOX for Boosting Piezoelectric-Photocatalytic Removal of Uranium(VI).

Piezoelectric-photocatalysis is distinguished by its piezoelectricity as an external force that induces deformation within the catalyst to engender a polarized electric field compared to conventional photocatalysis. Herein, the piezoelectric photocatalyst BiOBr has been expertly synthesized via a plasma process and applied for piezoelectric-photocatalysis removal of uranium(VI) for the first time. The abundant surface oxygen vacancies (OVs) could induce a dipole moment and built-in electric field, which endows BiOBr with excellent separation and transport efficiency of photogenerated charges to actuate more charges to participate in the piezoelectric-photocatalytic reduction process.

Water vapor assisted aramid nanofiber reinforcement for strong, tough and ionically conductive organohydrogels as high-performance strain sensors.

Conductive organohydrogels have gained increasing attention in wearable sensors, flexible batteries, and soft robots due to their exceptional environment adaptability and controllable conductivity. However, it is still difficult for conductive organohydrogels to achieve simultaneous improvement in mechanical and electrical properties. Here, we propose a novel "water vapor assisted aramid nanofiber (ANF) reinforcement" strategy to prepare robust and ionically conductive organohydrogels.

Nanofiber Composite Reinforced Organohydrogels for Multifunctional and Wearable Electronics.

Composite organohydrogels have been widely used in wearable electronics. However, it remains a great challenge to develop mechanically robust and multifunctional composite organohydrogels with good dispersion of nanofillers and strong interfacial interactions. Here, multifunctional nanofiber composite reinforced organohydrogels (NCROs) are prepared.

Green fabrication of durable foam composites with asymmetric wettability by an emulsion spray-coating method for photothermally induced crude oil cleanup.

Chemical spills, especially oil spills, are becoming an increasingly serious environmental issue. It remains a challenge to develop green techniques to prepare mechanically robust oil-water separation materials, especially those capable of separating high-viscosity crude oils. Herein, we propose an environmentally friendly emulsion spray-coating method to fabricate durable foam composites with asymmetric wettability for oil-water separation.

Solvent-Exchange-Assisted Wet Annealing: A New Strategy for Superstrong, Tough, Stretchable, and Anti-Fatigue Hydrogels.

Hydrogels are widely used in tissue engineering, soft robots, wearable electronics, etc. However, it remains a great challenge to develop hydrogels possessing simultaneously high strength, large stretchability, great fracture energy, and good fatigue threshold to suit different applications. Herein, a novel solvent-exchange-assisted wet-annealing strategy is proposed to prepare high performance poly(vinyl alcohol) hydrogels by extensively tuning the macromolecular chain movement and optimizing the polymer network.

Facile and Rapid Synthesis of Porous Hydrated VO Nanoflakes for High-Performance Zinc Ion Battery Applications.

Hydrated VO with unique physical and chemical characteristics has been widely used in various function devices, including solar cells, catalysts, electrochromic windows, supercapacitors, and batteries. Recently, it has attracted extensive attention because of the enormous potential for the high-performance aqueous zinc ion battery cathode. Although great progress has been made in developing applications of hydrated VO, little research focuses on improving current synthesis methods, which have disadvantages of massive energy consumption, tedious reaction time, and/or low efficiency.

4-Pentenoyl-isoleucyl-chitosan oligosaccharide and acrylamide functional monomer-dependent hybrid bilayer molecularly imprinted membrane for sensitive electrochemical sensing of bisphenol A.

In this work, an electrochemical sensor was designed for trace monitoring of bisphenol A (BPA) by decorating a hybrid bilayer molecularly imprinted membrane (MIM) on a multi-walled carbon nanotube-modified glassy carbon electrode. When BPA in the MIM was eluted, a composite molecularly imprinted electrochemical sensor was constructed. Under optimal conditions, the developed sensor showed two linear relationships between Δ and BPA concentration in the range of 0.

Sodium hypophosphite induced a simultaneous P doping and hollowing process of TiO spherical nanostructures with enhanced photocatalytic activity.

Sodium hypophosphite induced a simultaneous P doping and hollowing process of TiO spherical nanostructures and produced P-doped hollow spherical nanostructures via a simple one-step hydrothermal method. The as-synthesized P-doped hollow spherical nanostructures demonstrated significantly enhanced photocatalytic activity for MB degradation compared to the undoped TiO and P25 under sunlight irradiation.

Synthesis of magnetic orderly mesoporous α-FeO nanocluster derived from MIL-100(Fe) for rapid and efficient arsenic(III,V) removal.

A calcination time regulation method has been unprecedentedly used to adjust the orderly meso-structure of novel α-FeO nanoclusters derived from MIL-100(Fe) (MIL: Materials of Institute Lavoisier). The as-synthesized magnetic orderly mesoporous α-FeO nanoclusters were characterized by XRD, SEM, TEM, TGA, N adsorption-desorption isotherms, VSM, Zeta potential, FTIR and XPS. The 6h calcinated α-FeO nanocluster exhibited the optimal properties, including the high specific surface area and the orderly mesoporous properties, which facilitate the arsenic(III,V) adsorption capacity.