Design and development of photosensitizers that can efficiently convert energy of near-infrared (NIR) laser irradiation are of major importance for cancer photoassisted therapeutics. Herein, for the first time, it is demonstrated that Prussian blue (PB), a classic coordination compound, can act as a novel photosensitizer with efficient generation of singlet oxygen and excellent photothermal conversion via NIR photoirradiation-induced energy transfer. After modification with hyaluronic acid (HA), the as-prepared HA-modified PB nanocubes (HA@PB) are highly dispersible in aqueous and physiological solutions, as well as show excellent photothermal/photodynamic activities under NIR (808 nm) photoexcitation. On the basis of these features, HA@PB is used to study their in vitro and in vivo combined therapeutic effect. Owing to the CD44 ligand of HA, HA@PB have specific uptake by CD44-positive cells in vitro and can be precisely in vivo delivered to the tumor site. HA@PB as one of the synergistically photodynamic/photothermal combination nanoplatforms could achieve excellent therapeutic efficacy with targeted specificity under the guidance of dual-modality photoacoustic/infrared thermal imaging. Hence, this work is expected to pave the way for using PB-based nanomaterials as a promising multifunctional theranostic nanoplatform in biomedical fields.

Forward osmosis (FO) processes have recently attracted increasing attention and show great potential as a low-energy separation technology for water regeneration and seawater desalination. However, a number of challenges, such as internal concentration polarization, membrane fouling, and the tradeoff effect, limit the scaleup and industrial practicality of FO. Hence, a versatile method is needed to address these problems and fabricate ideal FO membranes. Among the many methods, incorporating polymeric FO membranes with inorganic nanomaterials is widely used and effective and is reviewed in this paper. The properties of FO membranes can be improved and meet the demands of various applications with the incorporation of nanomaterials. This review presents the actualities and advantages of organic-inorganic hybrid nanocomposite FO membranes. Nanomaterials applied in the FO field, such as carbon nanotubes, graphene oxide, halloysite nanotubes, silica and Ag nanoparticles, are classified and compared in this review. The effects of modification methods on the performance of nanocomposite FO membranes, including blending, in situ interfacial polymerization, surface grafting and layer-by-layer assembly, are also reviewed. The outlook section discusses the prospects of organicinorganic hybrid nanocomposite FO membranes and advanced nanotechnologies available for FO processes. This discussion may provide new opportunities for developing novel FO membranes with high performance.

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By spinning different proportions of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and polyacrylonitrile into filaments, discussing the structure of CNTs exposed on the surface of nanofibers after carbonization treatment at different temperatures, and the relationship between CNTs and pores in carbon nanofibers. Different pH, dosage, initial concentration of pollutants and adsorption time on the adsorption of Cr(VI) was studied on carbon nanofiber porous materials with carbon nanotubes. The results showed that the specific surface area of carbon nanofibers blended with CNTs increased to 37.627 m 2 /g and the pore volume reached 3.832cc/g. The porous adsorption material can reach the adsorption capacity of 25.17mgg À 1 within 20 min. When the adsorption reached equilibrium, the adsorption capacity reached 76.62mgg À 1 .[a] Dr.

In this study, we report a large-scale and low cost approach for the synthesis of three-dimensional (3D) polyvinyl alcohol/carbon nanotubes nanoporous architecture using self-assembly method.