Synthesis of crystalline WS with a layered structure and desert-rose-like morphology.

Tungsten disulphide has attracted great research interest due to its layered structure as well as physical and chemical properties. A less common type of tungsten sulphide, WS, has also been studied as an electrochemical catalyst, but its crystal structure remains unclear because it has only been prepared in the amorphous form. In this work, crystalline WS is synthesized with a desert-rose-like morphology through the sulphurization of WO·0.

Polyoxometalate steric hindrance driven chirality-selective separation of subnanometer carbon nanotubes.

Subnanometer single-chirality single-walled carbon nanotubes (SWCNTs) are of particular interest in multiple applications. Inspired by the interdisciplinary combination of redox active polyoxometalates and SWCNTs, here we report a cluster steric hindrance strategy by assembling polyoxometalates on the outer surface of subnanometer SWCNTs electron transfer and demonstrate the selective separation of monochiral (6,5) SWCNTs with a diameter of 0.75 nm by a commercially available conjugated polymer.

Atomic origins of the strong metal-support interaction in silica supported catalysts.

Silica supported metal catalysts are most widely used in the modern chemical industry because of the high stability and tunable reactivity. The strong metal-support interaction (SMSI), which has been widely observed in metal oxide supported catalysts and significantly affects the catalytic behavior, has been speculated to rarely happen in silica supported catalysts since silica is hard to reduce. Here we revealed at the atomic scale the interfacial reaction induced SMSI in silica supported Co and Pt catalysts under reductive conditions at high temperature using aberration-corrected environmental transmission electron microscopy coupled with electron energy loss spectroscopy.

Gelation of uranyl ions and gel-derived uranium oxide nanoparticles for gas sensing.

We developed a sol-gel method to synthesize uranium oxide nanoparticles with a clean surface and mixed valences of uranium at the surface. Uranyl gel was formed in ethylene glycol without incorporating any organic gelator and was readily converted to uranium dioxide nanoparticles with uniform size microwave treatment. The as-prepared uranyl gel showed a high storage modulus of 0.