Copolymer-Induced Intermolecular Charge Transfer: Enhancing the Activity of Metal-Free Catalysts for Oxygen Reduction

Breaking the electroneutrality of sp² carbon lattice is a viable way for nanocarbon material to modulate the charge delocalization and to further alter the electrocatalytic activity. Positive charge spreadsheeting is preferable for catalyzing the oxygen reduction reaction (ORR) and other electrochemical reactions. Analogously to the case of intramolecular charge transfer by heteroatom doping, electrons in the conjugated carbon lattice can be redistributed by the intermolecular charge transfer from the nanocarbon material to the polyelectrolyte. A copolymeric electrolyte, epichlorohydrin-dimethylamine copolymer (EDC) was synthesized. The EDC-modified carbon nanotube (CNT) hybrid was subsequently fabricated by sonication treatment and served as a metal-free carbonaceous electrocatalyst with remarkable catalytic activity and stability. The resultant hybrid presents positive charge spreadsheeting on CNT as a result of the interfacial electron transfer from CNT to EDC. DFT calculations were further carried out to reveal that the enhancement of the wrapped EDC polyelectrolyte originates from the synergetic effect of the quaternary ammonium-hydroxyl covalently bonded structure. The CNT-EDC hybrid not only provides an atomically precise regulation to modulate nanocarbon materials from inactive carbonaceous materials into efficient metal-free catalysts, but it also opens new avenues to develop metal-free catalysts with well-defined and highly active sites.     

Competitive Metal Coordination of Hexaaminotriphenylene on Cu(111) by Intrinsic Copper Versus Extrinsic Nickel Adatoms

The interplay between the self-assembly and surface chemistry of 2,3,6,7,10,11-hexaaminotriphenylene (HATP) on Cu(111) was complementarily studied by high-resolution scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS) under ultra-high vacuum conditions. To shed light on the competitive metal coordination, comparative experiments were carried out on pristine and nickel-covered Cu(111). Directly after room-temperature deposition of HATP onto pristine Cu(111), self-assembled aggregates were observed by STM, and XPS results indicated still protonated amino groups. Annealing up to 200 °C activated the progressive single deprotonation of all amino groups as indicated by chemical shifts of both the N 1s and C 1s core levels in the XP spectra. This enabled the formation of topologically diverse π–d conjugated coordination networks with intrinsic copper adatoms. The basic motif of these networks was a metal–organic trimer, in which three HATP molecules were coordinated by Cu₃ clusters, as corroborated by the accompanying density functional theory (DFT) simulations. Additional deposition of more reactive nickel atoms resulted in both chemical and structural changes with deprotonation and formation of bis(diimino)–Ni bonded networks already at room temperature. Even though fused hexagonal metal-coordinated pores were observed, extended honeycomb networks remained elusive, as tentatively explained by the restricted reversibility of these metal–organic bonds.     

Polar Order,Mirror Symmetry Breaking,and Photoswitching of Chirality and Polarity in Functional Bent-Core Mesogens

In recent years, liquid crystals (LCs) responding to light or electrical fields have gained significant importance as multifunctional materials. Herein, two new series of photoswitchable bent-core liquid crystals (BCLCs) derived from 4-cyanoresorcinol as the central core connected to an azobenzene based wing and a phenyl benzoate wing are reported. The self-assembly of these molecules was characterized by differential scanning calorimetry (DSC), polarizing light microscopy (POM), electro-optical, dielectric, second harmonic generation (SHG) studies, and XRD. Depending on the direction of the COO group in the phenyl benzoate wing, core-fluorination, temperature, and the terminal alkyl chain length, cybotactic nematic and lamellar (smectic) LC phases were observed. The coherence length of the ferroelectric fluctuations increases continuously with decreasing temperature and adopts antipolar correlation upon the condensation into superparaelectric states of the paraelectric smectic phases. Finally, long-range polar order develops at distinct phase transitions; first leading to polarization modulated and then to nonmodulated antiferroelectric smectic phases. Conglomerates of chiral domains were observed in the high permittivity ranges of the synclinic tilted paraelectric smectic phases of these achiral molecules, indicating mirror symmetry breaking. Fine-tuning of the molecular structure leads to photoresponsive bent-core (BC)LCs exhibiting a fast and reversible photoinduced change of the mode of the switching between ferroelectric- and antiferroelectric-like as well as a light-induced switching between an achiral and a spontaneous mirror-symmetry-broken LC phase.     

Efficient Syntheses of Traumatic Lactone and Rhizobialide

Herein, we report the total synthesis of traumatic lactone and rhizobialide by utilizing allenoic acid to construct the lactone ring. The key starting materials, allenoic acids, could be prepared by the ATA (allenation of terminal alkynes) of a terminal alkyne with an aldehyde that contained a protected hydroxyl group followed by hydrolysis. Importantly, the asymmetric synthesis could be realized just by replacing racemic diphenylprinol with (R)- or (S)-diphenylprinol to deliver the optically active allenoate.     

Specific interaction between fluorine atoms and thiol groups accounting for higher domain purity and photostability in narrowband BHJ systems

In order to explore the role of fluorine atoms on photostability as well as morphology control of active layer in the presence of 1,4‐butanedithiol (BT), the four polymers with or without fluorine atoms in the backbones including polythieno[3,4‐b]thiophene/benzodithiophene, poly[(4,8‐bis‐(2‐ethylhexyloxy)‐benzo(1,2‐b:4,5‐b9)dithiophene)‐2,6‐diyl‐alt‐(4‐(2‐ethylhexanoyl)‐thieno[3,4‐b]thiophene‐)‐2‐6‐diyl)], poly[4,8‐bis(5‐(2‐ethylhexyl)thiophen‐2‐yl)benzo[1,2‐b;4,5‐b′]dithiophene‐2,6‐diyl‐alt‐(4‐(2‐ethylhexyl)‐3‐fluorothieno[3,4‐b]thiophene‐)‐2‐carboxylate‐2‐6‐diyl)], and poly[4,8‐bis‐(2‐ethyl‐hexyl‐thiophene‐5‐yl)‐benzo[1,2‐b:4,5‐b0]dithiophene‐2,6‐diyl]‐alt‐[2‐(20‐ethyl‐hexanoyl)‐thieno [3,4‐b]thiophen‐4,6‐diyl] were selected for comparison. It is found that the specimens containing fluorine atoms in polymer backbones showed of higher stability after illumination for 1 h in the presence of BT additive, contributing to the higher domain purity. The specific interaction between fluorine atoms and thiol groups was demonstrated by the appearance of novel absorption peak at 2663.1 cm^?1, in addition to the broadening of peak at 2556.2 cm^?1 ascribing to S? H stretching vibration as confirmed by Fourier transform infrared (FTIR) spectroscopy. The finding may guide the accurate use of thiols as effective solvent additive in morphology and stability optimization. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Polym. Sci., Part B: Polym. Phys. 2019 , 57, 941–951     

Charge Transport through Peptides in Single‐Molecule Electrical Measurements

Charge transport across the peptide chains is one of the vital processes in the biological systems, so understanding their charge transport properties is an indispensable prerequisite to explain the complex biochemical phenomenon. Here, we review the charge transport mechanism, the influence of the special groups and the experimental conditions on the charge transport through the peptide backbone by employing the single‐molecule electrical measurements. Besides, we further review the recent progresses in charge transport properties of supramolecular interaction among the adjacent peptide chains. Finally, we discuss some experimental and theoretical contradictions existing in the charge transport through peptides and provide new inspiration for the future development of the bioelectronics at the single‐molecule scale.     

Patterning catalyst via inkjet printing to grow single-walled carbon nanotubes

We demonstrated a method to pattern catalyst via inkjet printing to grow SWNTs, using metal salt solutions as the inks and an ordinary office-use printer. We printed water solutions of cobalt acetate on hydrophilic Si substrates and grew high quality SWNT films.     

The visible and ultraviolet organic light-emitting diodes with germanium dioxide as facile solution-processed anode buffer layer

Germanium dioxide (GeO₂) aqueous solutions are facilely prepared and the corresponding anode buffer layers (ABLs) with solution process are demonstrated. Atomic force microscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and ultraviolet photoelectron spectroscopy measurements show that solution-processed GeO₂ behaves superior film morphology and enhanced work function. Using GeO₂ as ABL of organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), the visible device with tris(8-hydroxy-quinolinato)aluminium as emitter gives maximum luminous efficiency of 6.5 cd/A and power efficiency of 3.5 lm/W, the ultraviolet device with 3-(4-biphenyl)-4-phenyl-5-tert-butylphenyl-1,2,4-triazole as emitter exhibits short-wavelength emission with peak of 376 nm, full-width at half-maximum of 42 nm, maximum radiance of 3.36 mW/cm² and external quantum efficiency of 1.5%. The performances are almost comparable to the counterparts with poly (3,4-ethylenedioxythiophene):poly (styrenesulfonate) as ABL. The current, impedance, phase and capacitance as a function of voltage characteristics elucidate that the GeO₂ ABL formed from appropriate concentration of GeO₂ aqueous solution favors hole injection enhancement and accordingly promoting device performance.