Nickel Nanoparticle-Decorated Porous Carbons for Highly Active Catalytic Reduction of Organic Dyes and Sensitive Detection of Hg(II) Ions

High surface area carbon porous materials (CPMs) synthesized by the direct template method via self-assembly of polymerized phloroglucinol-formaldehyde resol around a triblock copolymer template were used as supports for nickel nanoparticles (Ni NPs). The Ni/CPM materials fabricated through a microwave-assisted heating procedure have been characterized by various analytical and spectroscopic techniques, such as X-ray diffraction, field emission transmission electron microscopy, vibrating sample magnetometry, gas physisorption/chemisorption, thermogravimetric analysis, and Raman, Fourier-transform infrared, and X-ray photon spectroscopies. Results obtained from ultraviolet–visible (UV–vis) spectroscopy demonstrated that the supported Ni/CPM catalysts exhibit superior activity for catalytic reduction of organic dyes, such as methylene blue (MB) and rhodamine B (RhB). Further electrochemical measurements by cyclic voltammetry (CV) and differential pulse voltammetry (DPV) also revealed that the Ni/CPM-modified electrodes showed excellent sensitivity (59.6 μA μM^–1 cm^–2) and a relatively low detection limit (2.1 nM) toward the detection of Hg­(II) ion. The system has also been successfully applied for the detection of mercuric ion in real sea fish samples. The Ni/CPM nanocomposite represents a robust, user-friendly, and highly effective system with prospective practical applications for catalytic reduction of organic dyes as well as trace level detection of heavy metals

Biomass-Derived Activated Carbon Supported Fe₃O₄ Nanoparticles as Recyclable Catalysts for Reduction of Nitroarenes

Highly porous beetroot-derived activated carbons incorporated with well-dispered magnetite nanoparticles (Fe₃O₄ NPs; average size <i>ca</i>. 3.8 ± 0.5 nm) were fabricated via a microwave-assisted synthesis route. The magnetic Fe₃O₄@BRAC catalysts so-fabricated were characterized by a variety of diffent physicochemical teniques, viz. XRD, FE-TEM, VSM, gas physisorption/chemisorption, TGA, XPS, Raman, ICP-AES, and FT-IR spectroscopy. The as-prepared catalysts were exploited for heterogeneous-phase reduction of a series of nitroaromatics (RNO₂; R = H, OH, NH₂, CH₃, and COOH) under KOH as a base, isopropyl alcohol acting as a hydrogen donor as well as solvent and also tested with other solvents. The reaction system not only exhibits excellent activity with high anilines yield but also represents a green and durable catalytic process, which facilitates facile operation, easy separation, and catalyst recycle

Chiral Skeletons of Mesoporous Silica Nanospheres to Mitigate Alzheimer’s β‑Amyloid Aggregation

Chiral mesoporous silica (mSiO2) nanomaterials have gained significant attention during the past two decades. Most of them show a topologically characteristic helix; however, little attention has been paid to the molecular-scale chirality of mSiO2 frameworks. Herein, we report a chiral amide-gel-directed synthesis strategy for the fabrication of chiral mSiO2 nanospheres with molecular-scale-like chirality in the silicate skeletons. The functionalization of micelles with the chiral amide gels via electrostatic interactions realizes the growth of molecular configuration chiral silica sols. Subsequent modular self-assembly results in the formation of dendritic large mesoporous silica nanospheres with molecular chirality of the silica frameworks. As a result, the resultant chiral mSiO2 nanospheres show abundant large mesopores (∼10.1 nm), high pore volumes (∼1.8 cm3·g–1), high surface areas (∼525 m2·g–1), and evident CD activity. The successful transfer of the chirality from the chiral amide gels to composited micelles and further to asymmetric silica polymeric frameworks based on modular self-assembly leads to the presence of molecular chirality in the final products. The chiral mSiO2 frameworks display a good chiral stability after a high-temperature calcination (even up to 1000 °C). The chiral mSiO2 can impart a notable decline in β-amyloid protein (Aβ42) aggregation formation up to 79%, leading to significant mitigation of Aβ42-induced cytotoxicity on the human neuroblastoma line SH-ST5Y cells in vitro. This finding opens a new avenue to construct the molecular chirality configuration in nanomaterials for optical and biomedical applications

Capturing the Local Adsorption Structures of Carbon Dioxide in Polyamine-Impregnated Mesoporous Silica Adsorbents

Interactions between amines and carbon dioxide (CO₂) are essential to amine-functionalized solid adsorbents for carbon capture, and an in-depth knowledge of these interactions is crucial to adsorbent design and fabrication as well as adsorption/desorption processes. The local structures of CO₂ adsorbed on a tetraethylenepentamine-impregnated mesoporous silica SBA-15 were investigated by solid-state ¹³C­{¹⁴N} S-RESPDOR MAS NMR technique and theoretical DFT calculations. Two types of adsorption species, namely, secondary and tertiary carbamates as well as distant ammonium groups were identified together with their relative concentrations and relevant ¹⁴N quadrupolar parameters. Moreover, a dipolar coupling of 716 Hz was derived, corresponding to a ¹³C–¹⁴N internuclear distance of 1.45 Å. These experimental data are in excellent agreement with results obtained from DFT calculations, revealing that the distribution of surface primary and secondary amines readily dictates the CO₂ adsorption/desorption properties of the adsorbent

Spatial Isolation of Carbon and Silica in a Single Janus Mesoporous Nanoparticle with Tunable Amphiphilicity

Like surfactants with tunable hydrocarbon chain length, Janus nanoparticles also possess the ability to stabilize emulsions. The volume ratio between the hydrophilic and hydrophobic domains in a single Janus nanoparticle is very important for the stabilization of emulsions, which is still a great challenge. Herein, dual-mesoporous Fe₃O₄@mC&mSiO₂ Janus nanoparticles with spatial isolation of hydrophobic carbon and hydrophilic silica at the single-particle level have successfully been synthesized for the first time by using a novel surface-charge-mediated selective encapsulation approach. The obtained dual-mesoporous Fe₃O₄@mC&mSiO₂ Janus nanoparticles are made up of a pure one-dimensional mesoporous SiO₂ nanorod with tunable length (50–400 nm), ∼100 nm wide and ∼2.7 nm mesopores and a closely connected mesoporous Fe₃O₄@mC magnetic nanosphere (∼150 nm diameter, ∼10 nm mesopores). As a magnetic “solid amphiphilic surfactant”, the hydrophilic/hydrophobic ratio can be precisely adjusted by varying the volume ratio between silica and carbon domains, endowing the Janus nanoparticles surfactant-like emulsion stabilization ability and recyclability under a magnetic field. Owing to the total spatial separation of carbon and silica, the Janus nanoparticles with an optimized hydrophilic/hydrophobic ratio show spectacular emulsion stabilizing ability, which is crucial for improving the biphasic catalysis efficiency. By selectively anchoring catalytic active sites into different domains, the fabricated Janus nanoparticles show outstanding performances in biphasic reduction of 4-nitroanisole with 100% conversion efficiency and 700 h^–1 high turnover frequency for biphasic cascade synthesis of cinnamic acid