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The electrical conductivity of covalent organic frameworks may be limited by a low degree of π-conjugation or structural disorder. Here the authors produce uniform and highly conjugated COFs via a reversible dynamic imine condensation and demonstrate enhanced electrical conductivity in their product.
Photoelectrochemical generation of hydrogen is of wide interest for promoting renewable energy. Here a BiVO4/WO3 photooanode is used to generate chlorine and hydrogen from acidic chloride media with Faradaic efficiency of up to 85% for chlorine and 100% for hydrogen over three hours of operation.
The exfoliation of covalent organic frameworks is a potential route to interesting two-dimensional materials. Here, the authors report a strategy incorporating metal ions and axial ligands to facilitate exfoliation of porphyrin COFs, and examine the photocatalytic activity of the resulting nanomaterials.
Reactions of ozone with human skin oils impact indoor air quality by depleting ozone and forming semi-volatile organic compounds. Here, the authors examine the impact of clothing on indoor air composition and human exposure by integrating indoor chemistry modeling over a range of spatial and temporal scales.
The hydration and ion pairing of metal-organic supramolecular cages plays a crucial role in their interaction with guests but is difficult to quantify with standard analysis. Here, the authors show that microwave microfluidics to measure the hydration and ion pairing of two tetrahedral metal-organic cages.
Catalytic oxygen reduction is an important process for clean energy production. Here the catalytic activity of trioxotriangulenes for the oxygen reduction reaction is shown to be correlated with their redox potential, offering a potential route to rationally tune their catalytic activity.
Self-assembled glycopeptides are increasingly used as biomaterials. Here the self-assembly of glycosylated peptides under crowded conditions is shown to yield laterally aligned fibres which exhibit superior resistance towards non-specific binding of proteins and cells.
Zinc oxide exhibits a sub-band-gap green emission, the origin of which is widely debated. Here a combination of photophysical and conductivity analyses reveal that adsorbed superoxide may be responsible for the strong green emission of zinc oxide.
Aqueous solutions of ionic liquids can undergo thermally-controlled phase separation, but the microscopic processes driving this are not fully understood. Here a combination of experimental methods and molecular dynamics simulations are used to probe the influence of local structure on the formation of micron-scale clustering.
Cerium–zirconium solids are key materials in heterogeneous catalysis but understanding oxygen storage and diffusion in bulk samples is a challenge. Here the authors use three-dimensional hard X-ray spectro-ptychography and unsupervised learning to achieve nanoscale chemical imaging of reaction events.
The triple phase boundary structure in solid-oxide fuel cells largely determines the thermodynamics and kinetics of electrochemical processes therein. Here the authors use atomic-resolution microscopy and reaction dynamics simulation to reveal three discrete hydrogen oxidation reaction pathways.
The reduction of CO2 by electro- and biocatalysis offers a promising route to the sustainable production of chemicals and fuels. Here, the integration of methanogenic or homoacetogenic microbes with earth-abundant electrodes allows robust, rapid, and selective CO2 reduction with coulombic efficiencies of up to 100%.
Mass transfer of guest molecules in nanoporous crystalline materials is dominated by surface barriers and intracrystalline diffusion. Here the authors derive an approximate expression of uptake rate relying solely on surface permeability, offering an approach to directly quantify both effects.
Catalytic insertion of carbon dioxide into epoxides offers a useful route to cyclic carbonates. Here cobalt(III) ONO pincer complexes are shown to catalyze this reaction at ambient pressure with turnover numbers of up to 200,000.
Activation of C-H bonds through visible light irradiation remains a challenge in attaining energy efficient organic transformations. Here the authors show an osmium(VI) nitrido complex which can perform nitrogenation of cyclic alkanes and arenes by acting as a strong electrophile in the excited state.
The relationship between molecular motion and catalysis in enzymes is debated. Here, simulations of cyclophilin A and three catalytically-impaired mutants reveal a nanosecond-scale interconversion between active and inactive conformations, orders of magnitude faster than previously suggested.
Metal-organic frameworks are commonly proposed as potential sensors for explosive compounds but the precise sensing mechanism remains unclear. Here, the authors experimentally assess the fluorescence-quenching mechanisms of a hydroxyl-functionalized MOF, as it interacts with nitroaromatics.
The deactivation of zeolite catalyst by sulfur contaminants is a major problem in direct olefin upgrading of crude oil. Here the authors perform mechanistic analyses of zeolite ZSM-5 catalysts to reveal the detrimental effect of sulfur on silver and gallium Lewis acid sites in the catalyst.
Polyphenols are widely studied as potential drugs for Alzheimer’s disease, but their development is limited by poor bioavailability. Here polyphenolic analogues of the Alzheimer's disease drug rivastigmine are shown to inhibit both cholinesterase and amyloid beta fibrillation in vitro and in vivo in a C. elegans model, providing a potentially general route for the development of polyphenol-based drugs.
The low toxicity of indium phosphide quantum dots makes them attractive candidates for biomedical applications but they typically exhibit low low photoluminescent quantum yield in aqueous media. Here the authors report a controlled-cooling based synthetic method which produces super bright quantum dots.