Comb-shaped sulfonated poly(aryl ether sulfone) proton exchange membrane for fuel cell applications

Structure design is the primary strategy to acquire suitable ionomers for preparing proton exchange membranes (PEMs) with excellent performance. A series of comb-shaped sulfonated fluorinated poly(aryl ether sulfone) (SPFAES) membranes are prepared from sulfonated fluorinated poly(aryl ether sulfone) polymer (SPFAE) and sulfonated poly(aryl ether sulfone) oligomer (SPAES-Oligomer). Chemical structures of the comb-shaped membranes are verified by ¹H nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) and Fourier transform infrared (FT-IR) spectra. The comb-shaped SPFAES membranes display more continuous hydrophilic domains for ion transfer, because the abundant cations and flexible side-chains structure possess higher mobility and hydrophilicity, which show significantly improved proton conductivity, physicochemical stability, mechanical property compared to the linear SPFAE membranes. In a H₂/O₂ single-cell test, the SPFAES-1.77 membrane achieves a higher power density of 699.3 mW/cm² in comparison with Nafion® 112 (618.0 mW/cm²) at 80 °C and 100% relative humidity. This work offers a promising example for the synthesis of highly branched polymers with flexible comb-shaped side chains for high-performance PEMs.     

Double emulsion (W/O/W) gel stabilised by polyglycerol polyricinoleate and calcium caseinate as mangiferin carrier: insights on formulation and stability properties

Mangiferin (MGF) is a phenolic compound isolated from mango, but its poor solubility significantly limits its use. In this study, MGF was embedded into the inner aqueous phase of W₁/O/W₂ emulsions. Firstly, the dissolution method of MGF was determined. MGF remained stable in solution with pH 13 at 30 min, and its solubility reached 10 mg mL⁻¹. When the pH of MGF solutions was adjusted from pH 13 to pH 6, MGF did not immediately crystallise, providing sufficient time to construct the MGF-loaded W₁/O/W₂ emulsions. Subsequently, the MGF-loaded W₁/O/W₂ emulsions were constructed using polyglycerol polyricinoleate (PGPR) and calcium caseinate (CAS). The formation and stability of the W₁/O/W₂ emulsions were investigated. The MGF-loaded W₁/O/W₂ emulsions stabilised with 1% PGPR and 1% – 3% CAS exhibited a low viscosity, limited loading capacity, and poor stability. Conversely, the MGF-loaded W₁/O/W₂ emulsions stabilised by 3%PGPR–3%CAS exhibited optimal loading capacity (encapsulation efficiency = 95.31% and loading efficiency = 0.91%) and stability, which was attributed to the fact that high viscosity and gel state retarded the migration of inner aqueous phase. These results indicated that the W₁/O/W₂ emulsions stabilised by PGPR and CAS may be a potential alternative for encapsulating mangiferin.     

Synthesis and characterization of a long side-chain double-cation crosslinked anion-exchange membrane based on poly(styrene-b-(ethylene-co-butylene)-b-styrene)

By choosing a triple block polymer, poly(styrene-b-(ethylene-co-butylene)-b-styrene) (SEBS), as the backbone and adopting a long side-chain double-cation crosslinking strategy, a series of SEBS-based anion-exchange membranes (AEMs) was successively synthesized by chloromethylation, quaternization, crosslinking, solution casting, and alkalization. The 70C16-SEBS-TMHDA membrane showed high OH⁻ conductivity (72.13 mS/cm at 80 °C) and excellent alkali stability (only 10.86% degradation in OH⁻ conductivity after soaking in 4-M NaOH for 1700 h at 80 °C). Furthermore, the SR was only 9.3% at 80 °C and the peak power density of the H₂/O₂ single cell was up to 189 mW/cm² at a current density of 350 mA/cm² at 80 °C. By introducing long flexible side chains into a polymer SEBS backbone, the structure of the hydrophilic–hydrophobic microphase separation in the membrane was constructed to improve the ionic conductivity. Additionally, network crosslinked structure improved dimensional stability and mechanical properties.     

Nano fibrillated cellulose-based foam by Pickering emulsion: Preparation,characterizations, and application as dye adsorbent

An ecofriendly and biodegradable porous structure was prepared from drying aqueous foams based on nano fibrillated cellulose (NFC), extracted from softwood pulp by subcritical water/CO₂ treatment (SC-NFC). The primary aim of this work was to use the modified SC-NFC as stabilizer for a water-based Pickering emulsion which upon drying, yielded porous cellulosic materials, a good dye adsorbent. In order to exploit the carboxymethylated SC-NFC (CMSC-NFC, with a degree of substitution of 0.35 and a charge density of 649 μeqv/g) as a stabilizer for water-based Pickering emulsion in subsequent step, an optimized quantity of octyl amine (30 mg/g of SC-NFC) was added to make them partially hydrophobic. A series of dry foam structures were prepared by varying the concentrations of treated CMSC-NFCs and 4 wt% was found to be the optimum concentration to yield foam with high porosity (99%) and low density (0.038 g/cc) along with high compression strength (0.24 MPa), superior to the conventionally extracted NFC. The foams were applied to capture as high as 98% of methylene blue dyes, making them a potential green candidate for treating industrial effluent. In addition, the dye adsorption kinetics and isotherms were found to be well suited with second order kinetics and Langmuir isotherm models.     

减水剂类型对赤泥—矿渣基地聚物注浆材料性能的影响及机理研究

针对赤泥等固体废弃物对环境危害性大且利用率低等问题,以碱激发赤泥-矿渣基地聚物注浆材料为 研究对象,研究了不同掺量的聚羧酸(PA)减水剂、醛酮缩合物(AKC)减水剂和萘系(N)减水剂对材料凝结时间、流动 性及强度等的影响,并通过 XRD、傅里叶红外光谱及 SEM 等设备对减水剂的作用机理进行研究。 结果表明:减水剂增 强了材料的流动性但降低了材料的剪切应力;N 和 PA 减水剂能缩短材料的凝结时间,但 AKC 减水剂会延长材料的凝 结时间;N 和 AKC 减水剂能提高材料的强度,但 PA 减水剂会降低材料的强度;N 减水剂对材料的综合性能提升效果 更加明显,其最优掺量为 0. 7%;减水剂对赤泥-矿渣基地聚物性能提升的作用机理主要是促进地聚合物凝胶的形成。 研究成果为拓展赤泥在工程上的使用途径和效率提供了理论指导。     

Spatiotemporal Magnetocaloric Microenvironment for Guiding the Fate of Biodegradable Polymer Implants

The degradation behavior of implants is significantly important for bone repair. However, it is still unprocurable to spatiotemporally regulate the degradation of the implants to match bone ingrowth. In this paper, a magneto-controlled biodegradation model is established to explore the degradation behavior of magnetic scaffolds in a magnetothermal microenvironment generated by an alternating magnetic field (AMF). The results demonstrate that the scaffolds can be heated by magnetic nanoparticles (NPs) under AMF, which dramatically accelerated scaffold degradation. Especially, magnetic NPs modified by oleic acid with a better interface compatibility exhibit a greater heating efficiency to further facilitate the degradation. Furthermore, the molecular dynamics simulations reveal that the enhanced motion correlation between magnetic NPs and polymer matrix can accelerate the energy transfer. As a proof-of-concept, the feasibility of magneto-controlled degradation for implants is demonstrated, and an optimizing strategy for better heating efficiency of nanomaterials is provided, which may have great instructive significance for clinical medicine.     

Mechanical Properties of Single-Layer Diamond Reinforced Poly(vinyl alcohol) Nanocomposites through Atomistic Simulation

Low-dimensional carbon nanostructures are ideal nanofillers to reinforce the mechanical performance of polymer nanocomposites due to their excellent mechanical properties. Through molecular dynamics simulations, the mechanical performance of poly(vinyl alchohol) (PVA) nanocomposites reinforced with a single-layer diamond – diamane is investigated. It is found the PVA/diamane exhibits similar interfacial strengths and pull-out characteristics with the PVA/bilayer-graphene counterpart. Specifically, when the nanofiller is fully embedded in the nanocomposite, it is unable to deform simultaneously with the PVA matrix due to the weak interfacial load transfer efficiency, thus the enhancement effect is not significant. In comparison, diamane can effectively promote the tensile properties of the nanocomposite when it has a laminated structure as it deforms simultaneously with the matrix. With this configuration, the interlayer sp³ bonds endows diamane with a much higher resistance under compression and shear tests, thus the nanocomposite can reach very high compressive and shear stress. Overall, enhancement on the mechanical interlocking at the interface as triggered by surface functionalization is only effective for the fully embedded nanofiller. This work provides a fundamental understanding of the mechanical properties of PVA nanocomposites reinforced by diamane, which can shed lights on the design and preparation of next generation high-performance nanocomposites.     

Material encapsulation in poly(methyl methacrylate) shell: A review

Material encapsulation is a relatively new technique for coating a micro/nanosize particle or droplet with polymeric or inorganic shell. Encapsulation technology has many applications in various fields including drug delivery, cosmetic, agriculture, thermal energy storage, textile, and self-healing polymers. Poly(methyl methacrylate) (PMMA) is widely used as shell material in encapsulation due to its high chemical stability, biocompatibility, nontoxicity, and good mechanical properties. The main approach for micro/nanoencapsulation of materials using PMMA as shell comprises emulsion-based techniques such as emulsion polymerization and solvent evaporation from oil-in-water emulsion. In the present review, we first focus on the encapsulation techniques of liquid materials with PMMA shell by analyzing the effective processing parameters influencing the preparation of PMMA micro/nanocapsules. We then describe the morphology of PMMA capsules in emulsion systems according to thermodynamic relations. The techniques to investigation of mechanical properties of capsule shell and the release mechanisms of core material from PMMA capsules were also investigated. © 2019 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Appl. Polym. Sci. 2019 , 136, 48039.     

Blocked crystallization in capped ultrathin polymer films studied by molecular simulations

The crystallization of capped ultrathin polymer films is closely dependent on film thickness and interfacial interaction. Using dynamic Monte Carlo simulations, the crystallization behaviors of polymer films confined between two substrates were investigated. The crystallization rate of confined polymers is reduced with high interfacial interactions. Above a critical strength of interfacial interaction, polymer crystallization in the thin film is inhibited within the simulation time scales. An increase in film thickness leads to a rise in critical interfacial interaction. In thicker films, the chains have more space to change conformation to form crystal stems. In addition, there are fewer absorbed segments in confined chains for the thicker films, and thus the chains have stronger ability to adjust their conformation. Therefore an increase in film thickness can cause a reduction in the entropic barrier required for the formation of crystals and thus an increase in the critical interfacial interaction. © 2018 Society of Chemical Industry