The lack of efficient hydrogen storage material is one of the bottlenecks for the large-scale implementation of hydrogen energy. Here, a series of new hydrogen storage materials, i.e., anilinide-cyclohexylamide pairs, are proposed via the metallation of an aniline-cyclohexylamine pair. DFT calculations show that the enthalpy change of hydrogen desorption (ΔHd) can be significantly tuned from 60.0 kJ per mol-H2 for the pristine aniline-cyclohexylamine pair to 42.2 kJ per mol-H2 for sodium anilinide-cyclohexylamide and 38.7 kJ per mol-H2 for potassium anilinide-cyclohexylamide, where an interesting correlation between the electronegativity of the metal and the ΔHd was observed. Experimentally, the sodium anilinide-cyclohexylamide pair was successfully synthesised with a theoretical hydrogen capacity of 4.9 wt%, and the hydrogenation and dehydrogenation cycle can be achieved at a relatively low temperature of 150 °C in the presence of commercial catalysts, in clear contrast to the pristine aniline-cyclohexylamine pair which undergoes dehydrogenation at elevated temperatures.
Herein we propose an alternative way to distinguish ionic liquids from Coulombic-dominated salts, based not on their upper limit melting temperature (100 °C), but on the trend of their phase-forming abilities to create aqueous biphasic systems as a function of temperature, in which a wider plethora of interactions can be appraised.
A vertically-stacked MXene/rGO composite membrane with ultrashort transport channels is reported here, which demonstrated outstanding molecular sieving, i.e., H2/CO2 selectivity of up to 83 together with high H2 permeance of 2.7 × 10-7 mol m-2 s-1 Pa-1 at 120 °C, highlighting its applicability for H2/CO2 separation in CO2 capture and sequestration.
We report a one-step emulsification and rapid freeze-drying process to develop a curcumin-ionic liquid (CCM-IL) complex that could be readily dispersed in water with a significantly enhanced solubility of ∼8 mg mL-1 and half-life (t1/2) of ∼260 min compared with free CCM (solubility ∼30 nM and t1/2 ∼ 20 min). This process using an IL consisting of a long chain carbon backbone as a surfactant, may provide an alternative way of enhancing the solubility of poorly water-soluble drugs.
The engineering of surface oxygen vacancies (OVs) in WO3 was primitively done using a facile solvothermal method. The photocatalytic activities of the as-prepared samples were studied by evaluating their performances in the photocatalytic OER. The best sample (W-3) yielded 57.6 μmol of O2 in 6 h under the illumination of simulated sunlight.
While lab-scale synthesis of trigonal-Zr2N2S, hexagonal-Zr2N2S and hexagonal-Zr2N2Se has been reported, meaningful data on the photophysical properties of IV-nitride chalcogenides in general are scarcely available. The first-principles calculations and genetic algorithm modeling in our work reveal the existence of remarkably stable, indirect gap trigonal-Zr2N2Se and trigonal-Hf2N2Se phases, which progress to direct gap, monoclinic materials in monolayer form. These structures display the desired optoelectronic properties, such as exceptionally high visible-UV absorption spectra (105-106 cm-1) and exciton binding energy below 0.02 eV. Strong hybridization between the Zr-d, N-p and Se-p orbitals is accounted for by the polysilicon comparable Vickers hardness (10.64-12.77 GPa), while retaining ductile nature.
A new adenine-containing metal-organic framework (MOF), [Zn4O(adenine)4(benzene-1,3-dicarboxylate)4Zn2] (named as ZnBDCA), was synthesized solvothermally. ZnBDCA possesses high quantum yield (>50%) and nano-channels that can encapsulate acriflavine molecules to build a host-guest chemopalette for approaching white-light emission.
Selected Brønsted acidic ionic liquids were tested as homogeneous catalysts for the dehydration of methanol to dimethyl ether. Ionic liquids incorporating an alkanesulfonic acid as a part of the cation, a complex acidic anion, [A(2)H](-), or both, proved to be good catalysts for this process, providing high conversions and selectivities. Homogeneous catalysis in the liquid state represents a novel approach to dimethyl ether synthesis.
Prostate cancer is currently diagnosed using the conventional gold standard methods using prostate-specific antigen (PSA) as the selective biomarker. However, lack of precision in PSA screening has resulted in needless biopsies and delays the treatment of potentially fatal prostate cancer. Thus, identification of glycans as novel biomarkers for the early detection of prostate cancer has attracted considerable attention due to their reliable diagnostic platform compared with the current PSA systems. Therefore, biosensing technologies that provide point-of-care diagnostics have demonstrated the ability to detect various analytes, including glycosylated micro- and macro-molecules, thereby enabling versatile detection methodologies. This highlight article discusses recent advances in the biosensor-based detection of prostate cancer glycan biomarkers and the innovative strategies for the conjugation of nanomaterials adapted to biosensing platforms. Finally, the article is concluded with prospects and challenges of prostate cancer biosensors and recommendations to overcome the issues associated with prostate cancer diagnosis.