金属-空气电池中双功能电催化剂微纳结构设计（英文）

金属-空气二次电池在可再生电能的存储和转换方面具有广阔的应用前景.在金属-空气二次电池的空气侧,放电时发生氧还原反应(ORR),充电时发生氧析出反应(OER).然而,ORR和OER反应的动力学过程缓慢,因此限制了金属-空气二次电池的实际应用.因此,发展高性能ORR和OER电催化剂对金属-空气二次电池的发展尤为重要.目前,大多数的研究集中在ORR或OER的单功能电催化剂上,而关于双功能电催化剂的研究和综述相对较少.两个反应均具有较高的过电位和较缓慢的动力学过程,而且充电过程的高电压会导致ORR催化剂失活,反之亦然.因此,开发针对这两个反应均具有高活性和高稳定性的双功能电催化剂极具挑战性.近年来,研究者对具有低成本和高性能双功能电催化剂进行了探索.这些双功能电催化剂包括碳基材料,过渡金属材料和复合材料.双功能电催化剂可以通过提高本征活性和表观活性两种策略来提高其整体的活性.其中,本征活性与晶体结构和电子结构密切相关,即可以通过调节晶体结构和电子结构来提高其本征活性.例如,可以改变金属-氧键的强度、氧空位浓度等来调变电催化活性.在碳基材料中掺杂杂原子可以改变碳的电荷密度分布,从而实现对电催化活性的提高.此外,其表观活性还可以通过改变形貌并利用协同作用来改善.构建特殊微纳结构是提高电催化活性的最常用策略之一.在这种情况下,电催化剂具有较高的比表面积,大量的活性位点和良好的电子传导性.同时,复合电催化剂组分之间在加速电催化过程中的协同作用不容忽视.本文将聚焦双功能电催化剂的微纳结构设计,并简要讨论了纳米结构的精细调控和对反应机理的认识.我们认为,未来的工作应继续加强ORR和OER的新型双功能电催化剂的开发,发展更多的合成方法对电催化剂的微纳结构进行调变,并对反应机理进行更深入的研究.首先,通过对结构的精细调变提高电催化剂的本征活性和表观活性.此外,通过多种原位表征方法揭示反应机理,这有助于电催化剂的设计和催化活性的进一步提升.基于此,开发出性能优异的双功能电催化剂以加快用于存储和转换可再生能源的可充电金属-空气二次电池的商业化进程.     

Morphology-Reserved Synthesis of Discrete Nanosheets of CuO@SAPO-34 and Pore Mouth Catalysis for One-Pot Oxidation of Cyclohexane

Discrete nanosheets of silicon-doped AlPO₄ molecular sieves (SAPO-34) with a thickness of ≈7 nm have been prepared through morphology-reserved synthesis with a lamellar aluminum phosphate as precursor. Cages of the nanosheets are in situ incorporated with copper oxide clusters. The CuO@SAPO-34 nanosheets exhibit a large external surface area with a high number of (010) channel pores on the surface. Due to the thin morphology, copper oxide clusters occupy the outmost cages with a probability >50 %. The distinctive configuration facilitates a new concept of pore mouth catalysis, i.e., reactant molecules larger than the pores cannot enter the interior of the molecular sieves but can interact with the CuO clusters at “the mouth” of the pore. In heterogeneous catalysis, CuO@SAPO-34 nanosheets have shown top performance in one-pot oxidation of cyclohexane to adipic acid by O₂, a key compound for the manufacture of nylon-66, which is so far produced using non-green nitric acid oxidation.     

Mixed Metal–Organic Framework with Multiple Binding Sites for Efficient C2H2/CO2 Separation

The separation of C₂H₂/CO₂ is particularly challenging owing to their similarities in physical properties and molecular sizes. Reported here is a mixed metal–organic framework (M′MOF), [Fe(pyz)Ni(CN)₄] ( FeNi‐M′MOF , pyz=pyrazine), with multiple functional sites and compact one‐dimensional channels of about 4.0 Å for C₂H₂/CO₂ separation. This MOF shows not only a remarkable volumetric C₂H₂ uptake of 133 cm³ cm^?3, but also an excellent C₂H₂/CO₂ selectivity of 24 under ambient conditions, resulting in the second highest C₂H₂‐capture amount of 4.54 mol L^?1, thus outperforming most previous benchmark materials. The separation performance of this material is driven by π–π stacking and multiple intermolecular interactions between C₂H₂ molecules and the binding sites of FeNi‐M′MOF . This material can be facilely synthesized at room temperature and is water stable, highlighting FeNi‐M′MOF as a promising material for C₂H₂/CO₂ separation.     

trans-RhCl(CO)(PPh3)2-catalyzed monomeric and dimeric cycloisomerization of propargylic 2,3-dienoates. Establishment of alpha,beta-unsaturated delta-lactone rings by cyclometallation

Cyclometallation of two unsaturated carbon-carbon bonds usually requires the application of low-valent metal catalysts, which could cleave the propargylic ester linkage. Thus, it is desirable to identify a catalyst which could undergo cyclometallation without cleaving the propargylic ester linkage. In this paper, we used trans-RhCl(CO)(PPh(3))(2) to realize the cyclometallation of propargylic 2,3-dienoates. The substituents at the 4-position of allenoate moiety nicely control the reaction pathway: when the 4-position of propargylic 2,3-dienoate 1 was monosubstituted with an aryl group, the bicyclic intermediate 7 formed by the cyclometallation could highly selectively undergo carbometalation with the alkyne moiety in the second molecule of propargylic 2,3-dienoate 1 to afford metallabicyclic intermediates 8a or 8b. Subsequent reductive elimination would afford 9, which could undergo an intramolecular Diels-Alder reaction resulting in the formation of polycyclic bis(delta-lactone)-containing structures 2. The intermediate could be trapped by adding 3-methoxyprop-1-yne affording cyclization-aromatization product 4p highly selectively. If the substituent at the 4-positon of the 2,3-allenoate moiety has a beta-H atom, sequential unimolecular cyclometallation/beta-H elimination/reductive elimination occurs to afford cross-conjugated 5(Z)-alkylidene-4-alkenyl-5,6-dihydropyran-2-ones. The Z-stereochemistry of the exo double bond was determined by the cyclometallation. Some of the alpha,beta-unsaturated delta-lactones could be easily converted to other synthetically useful compounds via reduction reaction, hydrogenation, and iodination/coupling protocol.     

Preparative isolation and purification of chemical constituents from the root of Adenophora tetraphlla by high-speed counter-current chromatography with evaporative light scattering detection

Preparative high-speed counter-current chromatography (HSCCC), as a continuous liquid-liquid partition chromatography with no solid support matrix, combined with evaporative light scattering detection (ELSD) was employed for systematic separation and purification of non-chromophoric chemical components from Chinese medicinal herb Adenophora tetraphlla (Thunb.), Fisch. Nine compounds, including alpha-spinasterol, beta-sitosterol, nonacosan-10-ol, 24-methylene cycloartanol, lupenone, 3-O-palmitoyl-beta-sitosterol, 3-O-beta-d-glucose-beta-sitosterol, eicosanoic acid and an unknown compound, were obtained. The compounds were all above 95% determined by high-performance liquid chromatography (HPLC)-ELSD, and their structures were identified by (1)H NMR and chemical ionization mass spectroscopy (CI-MS). The results demonstrate that HSCCC coupled with ELSD is a feasible and efficient technique for systematic isolation of non-chromophoric components from traditional medicinal herbs.     

Oil-in-water nanoemulsions for pesticide formulations

A two-step process for formation of nanoemulsions in the system water/poly(oxyethylene) nonionic surfactant/methyl decanoate at 25 degrees C is described. First, all the components were mixed at a certain composition to prepare a microemulsion concentrate, which was rapidly subjected into a large dilution into water to generate an emulsion. Bluish transparent oil-in-water (O/W) nanoemulsions were formed only when the concentrate was located in the bicontinuous microemulsion (BC) or oil-in-water microemulsion (Wm) region. The existence of an optimum oil-to-surfactant ratio (R(os)) in the BC or Wm region indicates that both the phase behavior and the composition of the concentrate are important factors in nanoemulsion formation. To demonstrate potential applications of these systems, they were employed to formulate a water-insoluble pesticide, beta-cypermethrin (beta-CP). The nanoemulsion was compared with a commercial beta-CP microemulsion in terms of the stability of sprayed formulations.     

Parallel separation of multiple samples with negative pressure sample injection on a 3-D microfluidic array chip

A simple and powerful microfluidic array chip-based electrophoresis system, which is composed of a 3-D microfluidic array chip, a microvacuum pump-based negative pressure sampling device, a high-voltage supply and an LIF detector, was developed. The 3-D microfluidic array chip was fabricated with three glass plates, in which a common sample waste bus (SW(bus)) was etched in the bottom layer plate to avoid intersecting with the separation channel array. The negative pressure sampling device consists of a microvacuum air pump, a buffer vessel, a 3-way electromagnet valve, and a vacuum gauge. In the sample loading step, all the six samples and buffer solutions were drawn from their reservoirs across the injection intersections through the SW(bus) toward the common sample waste reservoir (SW(T)) by negative pressure. Only 0.5 s was required to obtain six pinched sample plugs at the channel crossings. By switching the three-way electromagnetic valve to release the vacuum in the reservoir SW(T), six sample plugs were simultaneously injected into the separation channels by EOF and electrophoretic separation was activated. Parallel separations of different analytes are presented on the 3-D array chip by using the newly developed sampling device.     

Wave motion analysis in arch structures via wavelet finite element method

The application of B-spline wavelet on interval (BSWI) finite element method for wave motion analysis in arch structures is presented in this paper. Instead of traditional polynomial interpolation, scaling functions at certain scales have been adopted to form the shape functions and construct wavelet-based elements. Different from other wavelet numerical methods adding wavelets directly, the element displacement field represented by the coefficients of wavelets expansions is transformed from wavelet space to physical space via the corresponding transformation matrix. The energy functional of the arch is obtained by the generalized shell theory, and the finite element model for wave motion analysis is constructed according to Hamilton's principle and the central difference method in time domain. Taking the practical application into account, damaged arch waveguides are also investigated. Proper analysis of the responses from structure damages allows one to indicate the location very precisely. This paper mainly focuses on the crack in structures. Based on Castigliano's theorem and the Pairs equation, the local flexibility of crack is formulated for BSWI element. Numerical experiments are performed to study the effect of wave propagations in arch waveguides, that is, frequency dispersion and mode spilt in the arch. The responses of the arch with cracks are simulated under the broad-band, narrow-band and chirp excitations. In order to estimate the spatial, time and frequency concentrations of responses, the reciprocal length, time-frequency transform and correlation coefficient are introduced in this investigation.     

The Nonreciprocal Errors in Fiber Optic Current Sensors

Nonreciprocal errors in fiber-optic current sensors, which are induced by environment fluctuations such as temperature and linear and angular vibrations, are specified. These errors in three current sensor configurations are evaluated and compared theoretically. The comparison indicates that the in-line sensor with strip waveguide modulator has the best resistance to the mentioned three environment fluctuations. Methods that may be used to suppress the nonreciprocal errors in different sensor configurations are suggested.     

Catalytic enantioselective aryl transfer to aldehydes using chiral 2,2'-bispyrrolidine-based salan ligands

Chiral C?-symmetric diamines have emerged as versatile auxiliaries or ligands in numerous asymmetric transformations. Chiral 2,2'-bispyrrolidine-based salan ligands were prepared and applied to the asymmetric aryl transfer to aldehydes with arylboronic acids as the source of transferable aryl groups. The corresponding diarylmethanols were obtained in high yields with moderate to good enantioselectivitives of up to 83% ee.