The C/S cathode with only 0.5 wt % binder, composed with Nafion and PVP, was assembled layer-by-layer for lithium-sulfur battery (Li-S) application. It achieved excellent binding strength and battery performance compared to the cathode with 10 wt % PVDF, which is promising to further increase the practical energy density of Li-S batteries.

As photosynthetic organisms, microalgae can efficiently convert solar energy into biomass. Microalgae are currently used as an important source of valuable natural biologically active molecules, such as carotenoids, chlorophyll, long-chain polyunsaturated fatty acids, phycobiliproteins, carotenoids and enzymes. Significant advances have been achieved in microalgae biotechnology over the last decade, and the use of microalgae as bioreactors for expressing recombinant proteins is receiving increased interest. Compared with the bioreactor systems that are currently in use, microalgae may be an attractive alternative for the production of pharmaceuticals, recombinant proteins and other valuable products. Products synthesized via the genetic engineering of microalgae include vaccines, antibodies, enzymes, blood-clotting factors, immune regulators, growth factors, hormones, and other valuable products, such as the anticancer agent Taxol. In this paper, we briefly compare the currently used bioreactor systems, summarize the progress in genetic engineering of microalgae, and discuss the potential for microalgae as bioreactors to produce pharmaceuticals.

In this paper, a simple and rapid colorimetric method, which does not require any expensive and complex instruments, is established for the determination of melamine in dairy products. Lower than 2.5 ppm (the safety limit in the USA and EU) of melamine in real samples can be detected exactly with the recoveries in a range from 98-115% using a 721-A spectrophotometer. More significantly, the existence of melamine can be visually evaluated easily without the aid of any instrumentation.

This paper describes an approach to determine melamine (MEL) in liquid milk, yogurt, whole milk powder, fish feed, and fish at residue levels using capillary zone electrophoresis with diode array detection (CZE-DAD) for the first time. Suspicious samples were extracted with 1% trichloroacetic acid while 1 mL of chloroform was used to precipitate fat in the real samples. After centrifuging and filtering, the extract was analyzed by CZE-DAD directly. By investigating the variables of extraction, separation, and detection in detail, the entire analytical procedure including sample preparation could be completed within 30 min. The limits of detection and quantitation for MEL were found to be 0.01 and 0.05 microg mL(-1), respectively. The proposed method was successfully applied for the analysis of MEL in dairy products, fish feed, and fish with total recoveries ranging from 93 to 104%.

1D oriented ordered cross-linking hierarchical porous carbon fibers were fabricated successfully. The prepared cross-linking hierarchical porous carbon fibers (CHPCF) as the sulfur immobilizer demonstrated excellent cycling stability and high C-rate performance in Li–S batteries.

The lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries suffer from poor cycling stability caused by its own drawbacks, namely, shuttle effect, which makes it far from conquering the marketplace. To tackle this problem, a novel French fries-like hierarchical porous carbon (FLHPC) with one-dimension (1D) structure was constructed by carbonizing aluminum metal organic frame (Al-MOF). In FLHPC, sulfur was infiltrated mainly into the micro-and mesopores, while macro-pores were used to facilitate the transportation of Li ions (Li + ). On the basis of this concept, even without LiNO3 as additive, the Li-S batteries not only delivered a high initial discharge capacity of nearly 1200 mA h g -1 at 0.1 C (1 C = 1672 mA h g -1 ) but also showed good cycling stability of 68% capacity remained at 0.5 C after 200 cycles. In addition, when the capacity rate (C-rate) increased to 2 C, a high discharge capacity of 763 mA h g -1 was presented after 20 cycles, proving excellent C-rate performance.

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