An
increasing utilization of flexible healthcare electronics and
biomedicine-related therapeutic materials urges the development of
multifunctional wearable/flexible smart fabrics for personal therapy
and health management. However, it is currently a challenge to fabricate
multifunctional and on-body healthcare electronic devices with reliable
mechanical flexibility, excellent breathability, and self-controllable
joule heating effects. Here, we fabricate a multifunctional MXene-based
smart fabric by depositing 2D Ti3C2T
x
nanosheets onto cellulose fiber nonwoven fabric via special MXene–cellulose fiber interactions. Such
multifunctional fabrics exhibit sensitive and reversible humidity
response upon H2O-induced swelling/contraction of channels
between the MXene interlayers, enabling wearable respiration monitoring
application. Besides, it can also serve as a low-voltage thermotherapy
platform due to its fast and stable electro-thermal response. Interestingly,
water molecular extraction induces electrical response upon heating, i.e., functioning as a temperature alarm, which allows for
real-time temperature monitoring for thermotherapy platform without
low-temperature burn risk. Furthermore, metal-like conductivity of
MXene renders the fabric an excellent Joule heating effect, which
can moderately kill bacteria surrounding the wound in bacteria-infected
wound healing therapy. This work introduces a multifunctional smart
flexible fabric suitable for next-generation wearable electronic devices
for mobile healthcare and personal medical therapy.
Solar-driven interfacial water evaporation is regarded as an effective, renewable, and environment-friendly technology for clean water production. However, biofouling caused by the nonspecific interaction between the steam generator and biofoulants generally hinders the efficient application of wastewater treatment. Herein, this work reports a facile strategy to fabricate flexible anti-biofouling fibrous photothermal membrane consisting of a MXene-coated cellulose membrane for highly efficient solar-driven water steam evaporation toward water purification applications. The as-prepared MXene/cellulose photothermal membrane exhibits light absorption efficiency as high as ∼94% in a wide solar spectrum range and a water evaporation rate up to 1.44 kg m −2 h −1 under one solar illumination. Also, the MXene/cellulose membrane shows very high antibacterial efficiency (above 99.9%) owing to the MXene coating as a highly effective bacteriostatic agent. Such a flexible, antibiofouling, and high-efficiency photothermal membrane sheds light on practical applications in long-term wastewater treatments.
An all-weather steam generation system is achieved based on the alternative photo-thermal and electro-thermal conversion of crosslinked MXene aerogels.
A facile bottom-up strategy was developed to fabricate nitrogen-doped graphene sheets (NGSs) from glucose using a sacrificial template synthesis method. Three main types of nitrogen dopants (pyridinic, pyrrolic and graphitic nitrogens) were introduced into the graphene lattice, and an inimitable microporous structure of NGS with a high specific surface area of 504 m(2) g(-1) was obtained. Particularly, with hybrid features of lithium ion batteries and Faradic capacitors at a low rate and features of Faradic capacitors at a high rate, the NGS presents a superior lithium storage performance. During electrochemical cycling, the NGS electrode afforded an enhanced reversible capacity of 832.4 mA h g(-1) at 100 mA g(-1) and an excellent cycling stability of 750.7 mA h g(-1) after 108 discharge-charge cycles. Furthermore, an astonishing rate capability of 333 mA h g(-1) at 10,000 mA g(-1) and a high rate cycle performance of 280.6 mA h g(-1) even after 1200 cycles were also achieved, highlighting the significance of nitrogen doping on the maximum utilization of graphene-based materials for advanced lithium storage.
As a renewable and environment-friendly technology for seawater desalination and wastewater purification, solar energy triggered steam generation is attractive to address the long-standing global water scarcity issues. However, practical utilization of solar energy for steam generation is severely restricted by the complex synthesis, low energy conversion efficiency, insufficient solar spectrum absorption and water extraction capability of state-of-the-art technologies. Here, for the first time, we report a facile strategy to realize hydrogen bond induced self-assembly of a polydopamine (PDA)@MXene microsphere photothermal layer for synergistically achieving wide-spectrum and highly efficient solar absorption capability (~ 96% in a wide solar spectrum range of 250-1,500 nm wavelength). Moreover, such a system renders fast water transport and vapor escaping due to the intrinsically hydrophilic nature of both MXene and PDA, as well as the interspacing between core-shell microspheres. The solar-to-vapor conversion efficiencies under the solar illumination of 1 sun and 4 sun are as high as 85.2% and 93.6%, respectively. Besides, the PDA@MXene photothermal layer renders the system durable mechanical properties, allowing producing clean water from seawater with the salt rejection rate beyond 99%. Furthermore, stable light absorption performance can be achieved and well maintained due to the formation of ternary TiO 2 /C/MXene complex caused by oxidative degradation of MXene. Therefore, this work proposes an attractive MXene-assisted strategy for fabricating high performance photothermal composites for advanced solar-driven seawater desalination applications.
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