Latest ArticlesIn this work, the phase-transitioned BSA (PTB) film using the mild and fast fabrication process adhered to the capillary inner wall uniformly, and the fabricated PTB film-coated capillary column was applied to realize open tubular capillary electrochromatography (OT-CEC) enantioseparation. The enantioseparation ability of PTB film-coated capillary was evaluated with eight pairs of chiral analytes including drugs and neurotransmitters, all achieving good resolution and symmetrical peak shape. For three consecutive runs, the relative standard deviations (RSD) of migration time for intra-day, inter-day, and column-to-column repeatability were in the range of 0.3%–3.5%, 0.2%–4.9% and 2.1%–7.7%, respectively. Moreover, the PTB film-coated capillary column ran continuously over 300 times with high separation efficiency. Therefore, the coating method based on BSA self-assembly supramolecular film can be extended to the preparation of other proteinaceous capillary columns.
Water electrolysis technology holds the perfect promise of the hydrogen production, yet control of efficiency and rate of water electrolysis greatly relies on the availability of high-performance electrode materials for kinetic-sluggish oxygen evolution reaction (OER). Accordingly, substantial endeavors have been made to explore advanced electrode materials over the past decade. Recently, RuO2 and RuO2-based materials have been demonstrated to be promising for OER due to their remarkable electrocatalytic activity and pH-universal application. Herein, the great achievements and progresses of this flourishing spot are comprehensively reviewed, which are started by a general description of OER to understand the reaction mechanism in detail. Subsequently, the key advantages and issues of RuO2 towards OER are also introduced, followed by proposing many advanced strategies for further promoting the electrocatalytic OER performance of RuO2. Finally, the daunting challenges and future progresses of RuO2 electrocatalysts toward practical water oxidation are highlighted, aiming to provide guidance for the fabrication of desirable RuO2-based electrocatalysts toward OER.
Injectable hydrogels have been considered as promising materials for bone regeneration, but their osteoinduction and mechanical performance are yet to be improved. In this study, a novel biocompatible injectable and self-healing nano hybrid hydrogel was on-demand prepared via a fast (within 30 s) and easy gelation approach by reversible Schiff base formed between −CH=O of oxidized sodium alginate (OSA) and −NH2 of glycol chitosan (GCS) mixed with calcium phosphate nanoparticles (CaP NPs). Its raw materials can be ready in large quantities by a simple synthesis process. The mechanical strength, degradation and swelling behavior of the hydrogel can be readily controlled by simply controlling the molar ratio of −CH=O and −NH2. This hydrogel exhibits pH responsiveness, good degradability and biocompatibility. The hydrogel used as the matrix for mesenchymal stem cells can significantly induce the proliferation, differentiation and osteoinduction in vitro. These results showed this novel hydrogel is an ideal candidate for applications in bone tissue regeneration and drug delivery.
Owing to the special formation of photopolymerized hydrogels, they can effectively control the formation of hydrogels in space and time. Moreover, the photopolymerized hydrogels have mild formation conditions and biocompatibility; therefore, they can be widely used in tissue engineering. With the development and application of manufacturing technology, photopolymerized hydrogels can be widely used in cell encapsulation, scaffold materials, and other tissue engineering fields through more elaborate manufacturing methods. This review covers the types of photoinitiators, manufacturing technologies for photopolymerized hydrogels as well as the materials used, and a summary of the applications of photopolymerized hydrogels in tissue engineering.
This study was to investigate the optimal additions of the cellulose decomposition reaction to obtain the most yield of 5-HMF and other furan derivatives in various biphasic systems with FeCl3-CuCl2 mixed catalysts, and explore its depolymerization kinetics. A series of controllable reactions have been performed under mild environmentally friendly atmosphere. The experiment results showed that 49.13 wt% of 5-HMF was the maximum production along with 2.98 wt% other furan derivatives catalyzed by mixed Lewis acid FeCl3-CuCl2 under the two phases which included high concentration NaCl aqueous phase and n-butanol organic phase at 190 ℃ for 45 min. The conclusion suggested that two-phase systems benefited the yield of 5-HMF, furan derivatives via extracting the target products from reaction phase to organic phase to avoid rehydration of 5-HMF. The kinetic calculation revealed the conversion with mixed catalysts had lower reaction apparent activation energy (21.65 kJ/mol, 190-230 ℃) and the reaction rate was faster than that with acid-based catalysts. Based on experiment exploration, the probable mechanism of cellulose decomposition with FeCl3-CuCl2 was proposed.
Carbon dots (Cdots) has been proved to possess the catalytic decomposition of H2O2 in the photocatalytic system. It is a potential photo-Fenton catalyst. Since multiple emissive Cdots have different light response range. There is rarely investigation on the performance of Cdots based photo-Fenton on the light wavelength. Herein, blue, green and red emissive carbon dots were synthesized from the different ratio of o-phenylenediamine and catechol by the solvothermal method. They exhibit different light adsorption range from UV to visible light. Furthermore, the photo-Fenton reactivity of Cdots was studied for catalyzing the decomposition of H2O2 to generate free hydroxyl radicals and consequently applying for the removal of methyl blue. The results exhibit that Cdots with the broader light adsorption rang possess the stronger catalytic activity for the photo-Fenton reaction. The H2O2 decomposition rate of red emissive Cdots is 0.074 min−1, which is 2.64 and 1.46 times than the blue and green emissive Cdots, respectively. And the radical detection results confirm that the photo-Fenton happens in the reaction. In addition, the Cdots photo-Fenton can be carried out in the broad pH range from acidic to basic solution, which has a great potential to treat wastewater in the neutral system.
Nowadays, Cu-based materials have attracted extensive attention as electrocatalysts, while the inherent reason of the filling of high anti-bonding state of Cu d band (3d104s1) makes it difficult to hybridize with O 2p band of oxygen intermediates during the adsorption process of oxygen evolution reaction (OER). To increase the efficiency of Cu-based electrocatalysts, efforts have been made to optimize the electronic structures and to create surface defects and hierarchical nanostructures with more exposed accessible active sites. Herein, we report a facile method for preparing CuO electrocatalysts with hierarchical nanostructures using the Cu-alanine complex as a precursor through room-temperature chemical precipitation and subsequent calcination in air. Investigations of products obtained at different calcination temperatures reveal the relationship between OER activities and the material characteristics such as specific surface areas, crystal growth orientations, and element components. The product obtained at 500 ℃ exhibits the smallest overpotential of 290 mV in 1.0 mol/L KOH for electrocatalyzing OER. Combining with various characterizations of CuO electrocatalysts after OER activities, the possible catalytic mechanism and the influence factors of their OER performance are also discussed.
Noble-metal-free photocatalysts with high and stable performance provide an environmentally-friendly and cost-efficient route for green organic synthesis. In this work, CdS nanoparticles with small particle size and different amount were successfully deposited on the surface of covalent organic frameworks (COFs). The deposition of suitable content of CdS on COFs could not only modify the light adsorption ability and the intrinsic electronic properties, but also enhance the photocatalytic activity and cycling performance of CdS for the selective oxidation of aromatic alcohols under visible light. Especially, COF/CdS-3 exhibited the highest yield (97.1%) of benzaldehyde which is approximately 2.5 and 15.9 times as that of parental CdS and COF, respectively. The results show that the combination of CdS and COF can improve the utilization of visible light and the separation of photo-generated charge carriers, and COF with the π-conjugated system as supports for CdS nanoparticles could provide efficient electron transport channels and improve the photocatalytic performance. Therefore, this kind of COF-supported photocatalysts with accelerated photo-induced electrons and charge-carrier separation between semiconductors possesses great potentials in future green organic synthesis.
MicroRNAs are a class of important biomarkers, and the simultaneous detection of multiple miRNAs can provide valuable information about many diseases and biological processes. Amplification-free determination has been developed for the analysis of multiple miRNAs because of its characteristic low cost and high fidelity. Herein, a method for the amplification-free analysis and simultaneous detection of multiple miRNAs based on a so-called pico-HPLC-LIF system is described. In this process, a bare open capillary with an inner diameter of 680 nm is used as a separation column for a sample volume of several hundreds of femtoliters (300 fL), followed by separation and detection. The technique has a zeptomolar limit of detection. The method was applied to detect cellular miRNA from adenocarcinomic human alveolar basal epithelial (A549) cell extracts, and the simultaneous detection of the mir-182, miR-155, and let-7a was achieved. The results showed that the expression of mir-182 and miR-155 was up-regulated and that of let-7a was down-regulated in A549 cells. This method for multiple miRNAs detection is expected to have broad applications in miRNA-based disease diagnosis, prognosis, treatment, and monitoring.
Upconversion (UC) technology makes it possible to harvest infrared (IR) light from the sun and has increasingly been employed in recent years to improve the efficiency of solar cells. The progress in the area concerns both research on fundamental principles and processes of UC and technologies of device fabrication. Significant increase of important solar cell parameters, like short-circuit photocurrent density and open-circuit photovoltage as well as the total photon-to-current efficiency, has been accomplished. We here review the research published during the last few years in the area, in particular we consider the two most cherished techniques, namely the incorporation of upconverting nanophosphors directly into the photoanodes of the solar cells and the introduction of plasmonic metal nanoparticles co-existing with the UC particles. Other ways to achieve strong field enhancement, and the use of the non-linear nature of UC, is to apply microlenses, with or without assisting plasmonic excitation. Further enhanced UC action has been demonstrated by broad band and effective harvesting by organic IR antennas, with subsequent mediation by an intermediate nanoshell of the energy into the upconverting core. Codoping, nanohybrid and layer-by-layer technologies involving upconverting particles as well as the use of upconverting nanoparticles in hole-transport and electrolyte layers, tested in recent works, are also reviewed. While most of these technologies employ upconverting rare earth metals for sequential photon absorption, the main alternative technique, namely triplet-triplet annihilation UC using organic materials, is also reviewed. It is our belief that all these approaches will be further much researched in the near future, with potentially great impact on solar cell technology.
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