Selective separation of gases/vapors with similar physicochemical properties involves energetically costly distillation processes. Alternative separation processes based on shape-selective molecular sieving, taking place on porous frameworks (or membranes), are less energy demanding but require an optimal balance between selectivity and diffusion kinetics (permeability). Herein, we report a rational strategy to select an optimal soft noncovalent microporous material (NPM) suitable for the low-energy separation of C-hydrocarbons with kinetic diameters in the range of 4.3-6.3 Å. This strategy is based on a Cambridge Structural Database search of diamondoid NPMs with a low packing factor, leading to the selection of an oxidotetrazinc cluster based diamondoid NPM network named DiaMM-1 containing tetrahedral voids of 336 Å (tetrahedron insphere diameter of 5.8 Å accessible through 8.2 Å triangular windows) suitable for this separation. Based on this result the fluorinated analogue DiaMM-2 was designed and synthesized. DiaMM-1 and DiaMM-2 exhibit permanent porosity and high thermal stability. The optimal combination of molecular crystal softness, pore size, and decoration of pore surface of DiaMM-1,-2 leads to high adsorbate diffusivity and low adsorption energy, allowing fast separation of hexane isomers and benzene/cyclohexane mixtures at low temperature.
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http://dx.doi.org/10.1021/jacs.8b09522 | DOI Listing |
Langmuir
January 2025
College of Bioresources Chemical and Materials Engineering, Shaanxi University of Science and Technology, Xi'an 710021, China.
A novel pH-responsive full-bio-based surfactant (Ca-S) containing a dynamic covalent bond is synthesized using renewable cashew phenol, 5-chloro-2-furanaldehyde, and taurine. The structure of Ca-S is characterized by Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy (FTIR) and H nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) analysis. Limonene containing oil-in-water (O/W) microemulsions are prepared on the basis of the Ca-S surfactant and are applied to the remediation of oil-contaminated soil under low-energy conditions at ambient temperature.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFISME Commun
January 2025
Department of Energy - Joint Genome Institute, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, 1 Cyclotron Road, Berkeley, CA 94720, United States.
Giant viruses (GVs; ) impact the biology and ecology of a wide range of eukaryotic hosts, with implications for global biogeochemical cycles. Here, we investigated GV niche separation in highly stratified Lake A at the northern coast of Ellesmere Island, Nunavut, Canada. This lake is composed of a layer of ice-covered freshwater that overlies saltwater derived from the ancient Arctic Ocean, and it therefore provides a broad gradient of environmental conditions and ecological habitats, each with a distinct protist community and rich assemblages of associated GVs.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFNano Lett
January 2025
Department of Chemistry, Institute of Biomimetic Materials & Chemistry, Anhui Engineering Laboratory of Biomimetic Materials, Division of Nanomaterials & Chemistry, Hefei National Research Center for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China.
The development of viscous-crude oil and water separation technology is important for overcoming pollution caused by oil spills. Although some separators responding to light, electric, and temperature have been proposed, their poor structural homogeneity and inferior controllability, together with weak capillary forces, hinder the rapid salvage of viscous crude oil. Herein, a Joule-heated hydrophobic porous oil/water separator is reported, which has advantages of low energy consumption (169.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFRSC Adv
January 2025
College of Environment and Chemical Engineering, Dalian University Dalian 116622 Liaoning P. R. China
Photocatalytic technology for removing organic dye pollutants has gained considerable attention because of its ability to harness abundant solar energy without requiring additional chemical reagents. In this context, YF spheres doped with Yb, Er, Tm (YF) are synthesized using a hydrothermal method and are subsequently coated with a layer of graphitic carbon nitride (g-CN) with Au nanoparticles (NPs) adsorbed onto the surface to create a core-shell structure, designated as YF: Yb, Er, Tm@CN-Au (abbreviated as YF@CN-Au). The core-shell composites demonstrate remarkable stability, broadband absorption, and exceptional photocatalytic activity across the ultraviolet (UV) to near-infrared (NIR) spectral range.
View Article and Find Full Text PDFAngew Chem Int Ed Engl
January 2025
School of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering, Inner Mongolia University, 235 West University Street, Hohhot, 010021, China.
Polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs) have attracted significant interest in material chemistry, particularly if they own extremely low band gaps and magnetic properties. However, challenges remain regarding the synthetic accessibility and energy saturation issues. In this study, we introduce NR-11, which consists of eleven aromatic rings in its main conjugation and is separately doped with two electron-rich nitrogen atoms.
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