There is, I think, something ethereal about i —the square root of minus one. I remember first hearing about it at school. It seemed an odd beast at that time—an intruder hovering on the edge of reality.

Usually familiarity dulls this sense of the bizarre, but in the case of i it was the reverse: over the years the sense of its surreal nature intensified. It seemed that it was impossible to write mathematics that described the real world in …

I and i

Hydrogen fuel is considered as the cleanest renewable resource and the primary alternative to fossil fuels for future energy supply. Sustainable hydrogen generation is the major prerequisite to realize future hydrogen economy. The electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction (HER), as the vital step of water electrolysis to H2 production, has been the subject of extensive study over the past decades. In this comprehensive review, we first summarize the fundamentals of HER and review the recent state-of-the-art advances in the low-cost and high-performance catalysts based on noble and non-noble metals, as well as metal-free HER electrocatalysts. We systemically discuss the insights into the relationship among the catalytic activity, morphology, structure, composition, and synthetic method. Strategies for developing an effective catalyst, including increasing the intrinsic activity of active sites and/or increasing the number of active sites, are summarized and highlighted. Finally, the challenges, perspectives, and research directions of HER electrocatalysis are featured.

Recent Advances in Electrocatalytic Hydrogen Evolution Using Nanoparticles.

Activated persulfate for organic chemical degradation: A review.

/pdf/nanoparticles-of-conjugated-polymers-1nls9f7jbi.pdf

Nanoparticles of conjugated polymers.

Conductive polymers combine the attractive properties associated with conventional polymers and unique electronic properties of metals or semiconductors. Recently, nanostructured conductive polymers have aroused considerable research interest owing to their unique properties over their bulk counterparts, such as large surface areas and shortened pathways for charge/mass transport, which make them promising candidates for broad applications in energy conversion and storage, sensors, actuators, and biomedical devices. Numerous synthetic strategies have been developed to obtain various conductive polymer nanostructures, and high-performance devices based on these nanostructured conductive polymers have been realized. This Tutorial review describes the synthesis and characteristics of different conductive polymer nanostructures; presents the representative applications of nanostructured conductive polymers as active electrode materials for electrochemical capacitors and lithium-ion batteries and new perspectives of functional materials for next-generation high-energy batteries, meanwhile discusses the general design rules, advantages, and limitations of nanostructured conductive polymers in the energy storage field; and provides new insights into future directions.

/pdf/nanostructured-conductive-polymers-for-advanced-energy-148heihahf.pdf

Nanostructured conductive polymers for advanced energy storage

An initiator is applied to synthesize single-walled carbon nanotube/polyaniline composite nanofibers for use as high-performance chemosensors. The composite nanofibers possess widely tunable conductivities (10(-4) to 10(2) S/cm) with up to 5.0 wt % single-walled carbon nanotube (SWCNT) loadings. Chemosensors fabricated from the composite nanofibers synthesized with a 1.0 wt % SWCNT loading respond much more rapidly to low concentrations (100 ppb) of HCl and NH(3) vapors compared to polyaniline nanofibers alone (120 s vs 1000 s). These nanofibrillar SWCNT/polyaniline composite nanostructures are promising materials for use as low-cost disposable sensors and as electrodes due to their widely tunable conductivities.

Carbon nanotube/polyaniline composite nanofibers: facile synthesis and chemosensors.

Ferrous-activated persulfate oxidation of arsenic(III) and diuron in aquatic system.

An electrochemical reduced graphene oxide/palladium (ERGO-Pd) nanocomposite modified glassy carbon (GC) electrode was fabricated by electrochemical reduction of GO and electrochemical deposition of Pd nanoparticles, respectively. Raman spectra indicate the GO can be successfully reduced to ERGO. SEM displays a high density of Pd nanoparticles loading on the surface of ERGO with a diameter of 50–100 nm. The electrode exhibits enhanced electrocatalytic behavior to the oxidation of nitrite compared to the GO and ERGO modified GC electrode. The effects of solution pH and amount of Pd deposition onto the ERGO-Pd modified GC electrode were investigated and discussed. Under the optimal conditions, the ERGO-Pd modified GC electrode can be used to determine nitrite concentration in a wide linear range of 0.04 and 108 μM and a limit of detection of 15.64 nM. The sensitivity of the electrode was 7.672 μA μM−1 cm−2. It also shows good storage stability.

Ya Zhang

Papers

Carbon nanotube/polyaniline composite nanofibers: facile synthesis and chemosensors.

Ferrous-activated persulfate oxidation of arsenic(III) and diuron in aquatic system.

Electrocatalysis and detection of nitrite on a reduced graphene/Pd nanocomposite modified glassy carbon electrode

Characteristics of equilibrium, kinetics studies for adsorption of Hg(II) and Cr(VI) by polyaniline/humic acid composite

High efficient removal of mercury from aqueous solution by polyaniline/humic acid nanocomposite