Circularly Polarized Luminescent Porous Crystalline Nanomaterials

Circularly polarized luminescence (CPL) active materials have attracted exclusive attention because of their wide potential applications in low-power-consumption displays, encrypted information storage, chiroptical sensors, and so on. However, there is...

A Versatile AIE Fluorogen with Selective Reactivity to Primary Amines for Monitoring Amination, Protein Labeling and Mitochondrial Staining

Specific bioconjugation for native primary amines is highly valuable for both chemistry and biomedical research. Despite all the efforts, scientists lack a proper strategy to achieve high selectivity for primary amines, not to mention the requirement of fast response for real applications. Herein, in this work, we report a chromone-based aggregation-induced emission (AIE) fluorogen called CMVMN as a self-reporting bioconjugation reagent for selective primary amine identification, and its applications for monitoring bioprocesses of amination and protein labeling. CMVMN is AIE-active and is capable of solid-state sensing. Thus, its electrospun films are manufactured for visualization of amine diffusion and leakage process. CMVMN also shows good biocompatibility and potential mitochondria-staining ability, which provides new insight for organelle-staining probe design. Combined with its facile synthesis and good reversibility, CMVMN not only shows wide potential applications in biology, but also offers new possibilities for molecular engineering.

Atomically Dispersed Fe-Co Bimetallic Catalysts for the Promoted Electroreduction of Carbon Dioxide

The electroreduction reaction of CO2 (ECO2RR) requires high-performance catalysts to convert CO2 into useful chemicals. Transition metal-based atomically dispersed catalysts are promising for the high selectivity and activity in ECO2RR. This work presents a series of atomically dispersed Co, Fe bimetallic catalysts by carbonizing the Fe-introduced Co-zeolitic-imidazolate-framework (C–Fe–Co–ZIF) for the syngas generation from ECO2RR. The synergistic effect of the bimetallic catalyst promotes CO production. Compared to the pure C–Co–ZIF, C–Fe–Co–ZIF facilitates CO production with a CO Faradaic efficiency (FE) boost of 10%, with optimal FECO of 51.9%, FEH2 of 42.4% at − 0.55 V, and CO current density of 8.0 mA cm−2 at − 0.7 V versus reversible hydrogen electrode (RHE). The H2/CO ratio is tunable from 0.8 to 4.2 in a wide potential window of − 0.35 to − 0.8 V versus RHE. The total FECO+H2 maintains as high as 93% over 10 h. The proper adding amount of Fe could increase the number of active sites and create mild distortions for the nanoscopic environments of Co and Fe, which is essential for the enhancement of the CO production in ECO2RR. The positive impacts of Cu–Co and Ni–Co bimetallic catalysts demonstrate the versatility and potential application of the bimetallic strategy for ECO2RR.

Carbon Nanotubes Use for the Semiconductors ZnSe and ZnS Material Surface Modification via the Laser-Oriented Deposition Technique

It is known that a material’s volume and the surface structuring by the nanoparticles causes a significant change in the material’s basic properties. In this aspect, the structuration of the surface of semiconductors is of interest, because their wide potential application in optoelectronics can extend the products’ transparency, hardness, wettability, and other important parameters. This paper presents possible methods for the surface modification of zinc selenide and zinc sulfide when carbon nanotubes are deposited on the surface by the application of the laser-oriented technique. It also shows changes of the spectral, mechanical, and wetting characteristics of the considered materials. Using the molecular dynamic simulations, the possible process of the carbon nanotubes penetration into the considered surfaces is presented. The simulation results are partially supported by the obtained experimental data.

Design and Implementation of 3D Printing Using a Universal Printing System on the Robot Arm UR5

The combination of two rapidly evolving technologies such as additive manufacturing technology and robotics opens up a wide potential for solving new production tasks. In advance, several challenges need to be addressed in order to intensify the possibilities for developing the combination of these technologies. The aim of the article is to point out the possibility of designing a simple universal printing system for the collaborative robot UR5 with an orientation on the need to implement 3D printing. The solution proposed in this way makes it possible to simplify the design of the movements to reduce any further structural modifications and also to reduce the potential mechanical deficiencies of the structure of the printing device.