Torressimmons0875

Well-controlled band engineering of a blue phosphorus/C2N van der Waals (vdW) heterojunction is investigated by density functional theory (DFT) calculations. PND-1186 The heterojunction has a natural type-II band alignment with a direct band gap value of 1.514 eV, which gives the enormous potential for solar cell applications. When the heterojunction is under solar illumination, the photogenerated electron-hole pairs can separate out on the disparate monolayers effectively. It induces the formation of spatially indirect excitons. Furthermore, it is found that the band gap of this heterojunction exhibits approximately linear variation with respect to the perpendicular external electric field. Very interestingly, a band alignment change from type-II to type-I occurs at an applied electric field of -0.2 V Å-1. This characteristic provides an attractive possibility to obtain novel multifunctional devices.Although zwitterionic hydrogels exhibit excellent hemocompatibility, their extremely low tensile strength is an obstacle for their use in blood-contacting devices. Electrospun fiber scaffold-reinforced zwitterionic hydrogels are a possible solution to overcome the challenges of both mechanical strength and hemocompatibility. In this work, electrospun polyurethane (ePU) fiber scaffold-reinforced sulfobetaine methacrylate (SBMA) hydrogels (SRgels) were prepared. The SRgels exhibited 4.7 ± 0.5 MPa tensile fracture stress, while the interpenetration between the hydrogel and the fiber scaffold remained intact even under 2.8 MPa tensile stress at 3.0 mm mm-1 strain load; this confirms that the SRgels maintain excellent hemocompatibility for both blood cell adhesion and fibrinogen adsorption under physiological dynamic loading and that dynamically structural matching is achieved between the scaffold and the zwitterionic hydrogels. Mechano-induced self-enhancement was also observed after preloading more than 2.0 mm mm-1 tensile strain to resist fracture. In short, the preparation of SRgels can enable zwitterionic hydrogels to meet the requirement for mechanical strength in bio-applications as blood-contacting devices.Silicene is a relatively new member of the growing family of two-dimensional single-element materials. Both top-down and bottom-up approaches provide access to silicene, the former via vapor deposition on a substrate and the latter via exfoliation of the layered CaSi2 precursor. Most top-down research has been concerned with understanding the various electronic, optical, magnetic, mechanical, electrical, thermal transport and gas-adsorption properties of silicene. By contrast, the focus on bottom-up silicene has primarily been on its synthesis, structure and chemical properties as they relate to its function and utility. Herein, emphasis is placed on the bottom-up strategy because of its scalability and the ease of subsequent silicene modification, with both qualities being important prerequisites for heterogeneous catalysis applications. In this context, synthetic freestanding silicene exists as single sheets or multilayer assemblies, depending on the CaSi2 exfoliation synthesis conditions. The structure of a sheet comprises three connected chair-configuration silicon 6-rings. This connectivity creates buckled sheets in which the hybridization around the unsaturated silicon atoms is sp2-sp3. By adjusting the CaSi2 exfoliation synthesis conditions, either layered silane (Si6H6) or siloxene (Si6H3(OH)3) nanosheets can be obtained. In our studies, we have explored the nucleation and growth of different transition metal nanoparticles on and within the layer spaces of these nanosheets, and explored their thermochemical and photochemical reactivity in CO2 hydrogenation reactions. An overview of these findings, related works and a new-and-optimized catalyst are provided in this article.Luminescent silicon nanocrystals (SiNCs) have attracted scientific interest for their potential use in LEDs, displays, lasers, photovoltaic spectral-shifting filters and for biomedical applications. A lot of efforts have been made to improve the radiative emission rate in SiNCs, mostly using quantum confinement, strain and ligands. Existing methods, however, are not easily upscalable, as they do not provide the high material yield required for industrial applications. Besides, the photoluminescence (PL) efficiency of SiNCs emitting in the visible spectral range also remains very low. Hence, there is a need to develop a low-cost method for high material yield of brightly emitting SiNCs. Theoretically, strain can be used alongside quantum confinement to modify the radiative emission rates and band-gaps. In view of that, high-energy ball milling is a method that can be used to produce large quantities of highly strained SiNCs. In this technique, balls with high kinetic energy collide with the walls of a chamber and other balls, crushing the particles in between, followed by welding, fracture and re-welding phenomena, reducing the particle size and increasing strains in the samples. In this study, we have used high-energy ball milling in an inert gas atmosphere to synthesize SiNCs and study their photophysical properties. The induced accumulation of high strain, quantum confinement and possibly also impurities in the SiNCs resulted in visible light spectrum PL at room temperature. This method is low cost and easily up-scalable to industrial scale.Two 1,2,3-triazolium ionic liquid diluents were evaluated for the extraction of gallium from spent Bayer process liquor by Kelex® 100. The first of these is a hydrophobic ionic liquid with a low water content, which allows the extraction of gallium directly from untreated Bayer process liquor. The second is based on a hydrophilic ionic liquid and which forms an aqueous biphasic system with concentrated salt solutions. The aqueous biphasic system homogenizes upon cooling, which allows homogeneous liquid-liquid extraction of gallium from carbonated Bayer process liquors. The influence of the ionic liquids on the extraction kinetics, mechanism, thermodynamics and selectivity is investigated. Stripping was examined from both systems and their potential for industrialization is discussed. Ionic liquids are shown to beneficially influence the extraction process from thermodynamic and kinetic perspectives. They are therefore promising to solve the issues which have thus far prevented the industrial application of resource-efficient solvent extraction techniques for the recovery of gallium from spent Bayer process liquor.