Mobility of water molecules in Li+, Na+ and Cs+ ionic forms of Nafion membrane studied by NMR

Correlation times and diffusion coefficients of water molecules were measured for the first time by ¹H spin relaxation and pulsed field gradient NMR in Li⁺, Na⁺ and Cs⁺ ionic forms of Nafion 117 membrane. Hydration numbers of Li⁺, Na⁺ and Cs⁺ cations were calculated. It was shown that at high humidity macroscopic transfer is controlled by the local translational motion of water molecules.     

开关型Pickering乳液体系

Pickering乳液以胶体尺寸的固体粒子代替传统表面活性剂作为稳定剂,具有超稳定,生物相容性好以及对环境友好等优点。开关型Pickering乳液可随pH值、CO₂/N₂浓度、温度、磁场强度及光强度等条件的变化而改变固体乳化剂的表面润湿性,实现在“乳化”与“破乳”之间的快速转换,在非均相催化、乳液聚合等诸多领域有广泛的应用前景。本文全面总结了近年来开关型Pickering乳液的研究进展及其在界面催化系统、液膜处理有机废水、药物的包封与释放等方面的应用。     

单气室固体氧化物燃料电池的材料、微堆结构与相关应用

单气室固体氧化物燃料电池（SC-SOFC）是一种整个电池处在单一气室中,阳极和阴极分别对混合气体中的燃料和氧气进行选择催化产生电动势的特殊结构燃料电池. SC-SOFC因其独特的原理和结构而具有无需密封、易于堆叠、可以快速启动和不易发生积碳等诸多优点,有很大的应用潜力. 作者在SC-SOFC的原理和特点的基础上,系统地总结了SC-SOFC所用材料、微堆结构设计、衰退机制及应用方面的研究进展;以提高SC-SOFC微堆的输出电压和功率为目的,改进预混气体环境下运行的微堆结构,采取星型布局的四电池微堆其输出功率提高到420 mW;随后,逐步改进供气方式,结合计算流体力学数值模拟研究,提出了单路多点供气和双路多点供气模式,成功地将单个SC-SOFC微堆模块的输出功率提升到8.178 W,进而开展了微堆模块外部串并联和与燃烧器的结合实验验证. 研究结果表明,SC-SOFC可以很便捷地连接成微堆模块并产生数瓦的输出功率,未来有望用于以供热为主型的热电联供系统. 作者还借助原位电阻和开路电压的原位同步测试,阐明了Ni在CH₄-O₂气氛中的反复氧化-还原循环是SC-SOFC发生不可逆衰退的主要机制,这一发现后来催生出氧化-还原法制备多孔金属的新技术.     

Molecularly Engineered 6FDA-Based Polyimide Membranes for Sour Natural Gas Separation

Glassy polyimide membranes are attractive for industrial applications in sour natural gas purification. Unfortunately, the lack of fundamental understanding of relationships between polyimide chemical structures and their gas transport properties in the presence of H₂S constrains the design and engineering of advanced membranes for such challenging applications. Herein, 6FDA-based polyimide membranes with engineered structures were synthesized to tune their CO₂/CH₄ and H₂S/CH₄ separation performances and plasticization properties. Under ternary mixed sour gas feeds, controlling polymer chain packing and plasticization tendency of such polyimide membranes via tuning the chemical structures were found to offer better combined H₂S and CO₂ removal efficiency compared to conventional polymers. Fundamental insights into structure–property relationships of 6FDA-based polyimide membranes observed in this study offer guidance for next generation membranes for sour natural gas separation.     

Dynamics of Bacteriorhodopsin in the Dark-Adapted State from Solution Nuclear Magnetic Resonance Spectroscopy

To achieve efficient proton pumping in the light-driven proton pump bacteriorhodopsin (bR), the protein must be tightly coupled to the retinal to rapidly convert retinal isomerization into protein structural rearrangements. Methyl group dynamics of bR embedded in lipid nanodiscs were determined in the dark-adapted state, and were found to be mostly well ordered at the cytosolic side. Methyl groups in the M145A mutant of bR, which displays only 10 % residual proton pumping activity, are less well ordered, suggesting a link between side-chain dynamics on the cytosolic side of the bR cavity and proton pumping activity. In addition, slow conformational exchange, attributed to low frequency motions of aromatic rings, was indirectly observed for residues on the extracellular side of the bR cavity. This may be related to reorganization of the water network. These observations provide a detailed picture of previously undescribed equilibrium dynamics on different time scales for ground-state bR.     

High effects of smoke suppression and char formation of Ni?Mo/Mg(OH)2 for polypropylene

The Ni? Mo/Mg(OH)₂ (NMM) hybrid as an efficient flame retardancy and smoke suppression composite for polypropylene (PP) was synthesized through Ni? Mo co‐precipitation on the surface of Mg(OH)₂ (MH) hexagonal nanosheets. Compared to PP/MH, PP/NMM exhibited excellent smoke suppressing and flame retardancy on the heat release rate, total heat release, smoke production rate, total smoke production, CO production rate and total CO production with the same loading. The reduced hazard of PP/NMM was mainly attributed to the high physical barrier effect of compact char residues on heat, smoke and combustible gas. The mechanism study indicated that multiwalled carbon nanotubes (MWCNTs) generated from the catalytic carbonization of PP by the Ni? Mo compound could play the role of “rebar” to strengthen the char residues, avoid the generation of cracks and form highly compact char layer. Furthermore, MgO could facilitate the production of MWCNTs through changing the pyrolysis process of PP and increasing the reaction time between pyrolysis gas and Ni? Mo compound. Hence, the new Ni? Mo/MH catalyst hybrid may explore the potential for solving the tough problem of the flammability and heavy smoke of the polyolefins system.     

Nb(iPrNPMe2)3Fe–PMe3: A potential high reactivity heterobimetallic catalyst for acetylene cycloadditions

Alkynes cycloaddition reactions are powerful tools for constructing cyclic molecules with optimal atom efficiency, but these reactions cannot proceed at ambient temperature without transition-metal catalysts. In this work, a heterobimetallic complex featuring an Nb–Fe triple bond, Nb(ⁱPrNPMe₂)₃Fe–PMe₃, has been evaluated as the potential catalyst for acetylene cycloaddition, using density functional theory. The calculated results show that the singlet-state (i.e. ground-state) Nb(ⁱPrNPMe₂)₃Fe–PMe₃ can be applied to benzene synthesis, but is not suitable for cyclobutadiene. Benzene can be obtained easily at room temperature and is the unique product on the singlet potential surface. The irradiation of infrared-red light can drive the excitation of singlet Nb(ⁱPrNPMe₂)₃Fe–PMe₃ to its triplet state. Both benzene and cyclobutadiene can be formed on the triplet reaction potential surface due to their low energy barriers. Therefore, Nb(ⁱPrNPMe₂)₃Fe–PMe₃ is a potential high reactivity heterobimetallic catalyst for the cyclotrimerization of alkynes. In the reaction process, the catalytic active site of Nb(ⁱPrNPMe₂)₃Fe–PMe₃ moves from niobium to iron.     

Proton conductivity study on three CS/IL@fle-MOF membranes

The low-cost, high specific surface area and porosity, controlled pore size, and chemical properties of metal–organic framework (MOF) materials have attracted much attention in the exploration of proton conduction. The method of chemically modifying MOF structures or introducing conductive medium into the holes can effectively improve the proton conductivities of the materials. Here, the structural tunability of ionic liquid (IL) and flexible MOF (fle-MOF) materials are matched to give full play to the conductivity of IL, the framework support, and the microporous effect of MOFs, which achieves the synergistic effect of performance and expands the temperature range of proton transfer. Three kinds of CS/IL@fle-MOF membranes were prepared by combining three fle-MOFs with 1-carboxymethyl-3-methylimidazole (CMMIM) in different proportions to obtain 15 pieces of membranes. The comparative analyses show that CS/IL@fle-MOF membranes have excellent proton conduction performance at a wider temperature range (263–353 K) and lower relative humidity (75% RH). Among them, the proton conductivities of CS/CMMIM@MIL-88A-25% and CS/CMMIM@MIL-88B-125% are up to 1.33 and 1.42 S cm⁻¹ at 75% RH and 353 K, respectively; whereas those of CS/CMMIM@MIL-53(Fe)-75% and CS/CMMIM@MIL-88B-125% reach up to 2.1 × 10⁻³ and 1.28 × 10⁻³ S cm⁻¹ at 75% RH and 263 K, respectively. The E_a of CS/CMMIM@fle-MOFs is in the range of 0.1–0.5 eV, suggesting that the proton transport follows predominantly the typical Grotthuss transfer mechanism. The results of this study indicate that the CS/CMMIM@fle-MOF membranes combinations offer great potential for the design of composite porous proton-conducting materials.     

Optimal method for preparing sulfonated polyaryletherketones with high ion exchange capacity by acid-catalyzed crosslinking for proton exchange membrane fuel cells

Sulfonated polyaryletherketones (SPAEK) bearing four sulfonic acid groups on the phenyl side groups were synthesized. The benzophenone moiety of polymer backbone was further reduced to benzydrol group with sodium borohydride. The membranes were crosslinked by acid-catalyzed Friedel-Crafts reaction without sacrifice of sulfonic acid groups and ion exchange capacity (IEC) values. Crosslinked membranes with the same IEC value but different water uptake could be prepared. The optimal crosslinking condition was investigated to achieve lower water uptake, better chemical stability (Fenton's test), and higher proton conductivity. In addition, the hydrophilic ionic channels from originally course and disordered could be modified to be narrow and continuous by this crosslinking method. The crosslinked membranes, CS4PH-40-PEKOH (IEC = 2.4 meq./g), reduced water uptake from 200 to 88% and the weight loss was reduced from 11 to 5% during the Fenton test compared to uncrosslinked one (S4PH-40-PEK). The membrane showed comparable proton conductivity (0.01–0.19 S/cm) to Nafion 212 at 80°C from low to high relative humidity (RH). Single H₂/O₂ fuel cell based on the crosslinked SPAEK with catalyst loading of 0.25 mg/cm² (Pd/C) exhibited a peak power density of 220.3 mW/cm², which was close to that of Nafion 212 (214.0 mW/cm²) at 80°C under 53% RH. These membranes provide a good option as proton exchange membrane with high ion exchange capacity for fuel cells.