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Plastic pollution in the marine environment and oily wastewater generated in industry are now recognized as a real threat, as they adversely affect the environment and cause health issues to living organisms as well. Nevertheless, the current methods for both oil/water separation and plasticizer removal are complex and costly. In this regard, a low-cost and environment-friendly superhydrophobic/superoleophilic material has been developed. Cotton sponge (CS) coated with polybenzoxazine (Pbz) and stearic acidfunctionalized carbon balls (CBS) [i.e., CS-Pbz-CBS] acts as a superhydrophobic/ oleophilic material. By employing surface modification of CS with Pbz-CBS, the hydrophilic CS gets transformed into superhydrophobic CS-Pbz-CBS possessing a water contact angle of 153°. A surface morphological study indicated the selective wettability produced by CS-Pbz-CBS materials as a result of tuning their surface composition and surface roughness as well. In addition to it, the prepared material CS-Pbz-CBS (6%) also possesses excellent mechanical durability, exhibits fast and efficient separation of oil− water mixtures, and can act as an effective material for plasticizer removal. Moreover, the prepared material, CS-Pbz-CBS (6%), has a volumetric absorption capacity, Q w (v/v), of 83.51 for CHCl 3 and provides a 95% separation efficiency for oil/water mixtures. The detailed investigation related to the preparation of these materials and their applicability in oil/water separation and plasticizer removal is analyzed.

Supercapacitors store energy either by ion adsorption or fast surface redox reactions. The capacitance produced by the former is known as electrochemical double layer capacitance and the latter is known as pseudo-capacitance. Carbon materials are found to be attractive materials for energy storage, due to their various micro-structures and wide source of availability. Polybenzoxazine (Pbz) is used as a source to produce carbon materials, due to the fact that the obtained carbon will be rich in N and O species for enhanced performance. Moreover, the carbon materials were produced via template-free method. In general, activation temperature plays a main role in altering the porosity of the carbon materials. The main purpose of this study is to find the suitable activation temperature necessary to produce porous carbons with enhanced performance. Considering these points, Pbz is used as a precursor to produce nitrogen-doped porous carbons (NRPCs) without using any template. Three different activation temperatures, namely 700, 800 and 900 °C, are chosen to prepare activated porous carbons; NRPC-700, NRPC-800 and NRPC-900. Hierarchical micro-/ meso-/macropores were developed in the porous carbons with respect to different activation temperatures. PBz source is used to produce carbons containing heteroatoms and an activation process is used to produce carbons with desirable pore structures. The surface morphology, pore structure and binding of heteroatoms to the carbon surface were analyzed in detail. NRPCs produced in this way can be used as supercapacitors. Further, electrodes were developed using these NRPCs and their electrochemical performance including capacitance, specific capacitance, galvanic charge/discharge, impedance, rate capability are analyzed. The obtained results showed that the activation temperature of 900 °C, is suitable to produce NRPC with a specific capacitance of 245 F g−1 at a current density of 0.5 A g−1, that are attributed to high surface area, suitable pore structure and presence of heteroatoms.

Mesoporous silica nanocarriers with dual/multifunctionalities are thought to be good candidates for dual/multimodal applications such as the combined drug delivery and bioimaging. In this study, a new red fluorescent organosilica...