No abstract

Direct micropatterning of superhydrophilicity on superhydrophobic surfaces was achieved by inkjet printing a mussel-inspired ink of dopamine solution onto the superhydrophobic surface, followed by the formation of polydopamine. The micropatterned superhydrophobic surfaces exhibited an enhanced fog-harvesting efficiency.

Highly acid-durable carbon coated Co 3 O 4 nanoarrays as efficient oxygen evolution electrocatalysts, Nano Energy,

The remote hydrogen plasma is able to create abundant S-vacancies on amorphous molybdenum sulfide (a-MoS ) as active sites for hydrogen evolution. The results demonstrate that the plasma-treated a-MoS exhibits superior performance and higher stability than Pt in a proton exchange membrane based electrolyzers measurement as a proof-of-concept of industrial application.

No abstract

Dihydronaphthyl-based [60]fullerene bisadduct derivative, NC(60)BA, was synthesized at mild temperature in high yield. NC(60)BA not only possesses a LUMO energy level 0.16 eV higher than PC(61)BM but also has amorphous nature that can overcome thermal-driven crystallization. The fabricated P3HT:NC(60)BA-based polymer solar cells exhibit superior photovoltaic performance and thermal stability compared to PC(61)BM-based devices under the same conditions.

The emerging molybdenum disulfide (MoS ) offers intriguing possibilities for realizing a transformative new catalyst for driving the hydrogen evolution reaction (HER). However, the trade-off between catalytic activity and long-term stability represents a formidable challenge and has not been extensively addressed. This study reports that metastable and temperature-sensitive chemically exfoliated MoS (ce-MoS ) can be made into electrochemically stable (5000 cycles), and thermally robust (300 °C) while maintaining synthetic scalability and excellent catalytic activity through physical-transformation into 3D structurally deformed nanostructures. The dimensional transition enabled by a high throughput electrohydrodynamic process provides highly accessible, and electrochemically active surface area and facilitates efficient transport across various interfaces. Meanwhile, the hierarchically strained morphology is found to improve electronic coupling between active sites and current collecting substrates without the need for selective engineering the electronically heterogeneous interfaces. Specifically, the synergistic combination of high strain load stemmed from capillarity-induced-self-crumpling and sulfur (S) vacancies intrinsic to chemical exfoliation enables simultaneous modulation of active site density and intrinsic HER activity regardless of continuous operation or elevated temperature. These results provide new insights into how catalytic activity, electrochemical-, and thermal stability can be concurrently enhanced through the physical transformation that is reminiscent of nature, in which properties of biological materials emerge from evolved dimensional transitions.

There is a strong demand to replace expensive Pt catalysts with cheap metal sulfides or phosphides for hydrogen generation in water electrolysis. Earth-abundant Fe can be electroplated on carbon cloth (CC) to form high surface area rugae-like FeOOH assembly. Subsequent gas phase phosphidation converts the FeOOH to FeP or FeP2 and the morphology of the crystal assembly is controlled by the phosphidation temperature. FeP prepared at 250 °C presents lower crystallinity and that prepared at higher temperatures of 400 °C and 500 °C possesses higher crystallinity, but lower surface area. The phosphidation at 300 °C produces nanocrystalline FeP and preserves the high-surface area morphology; thus, it exhibits the highest HER efficiency in 0.5 M H2SO4, i.e., the required overpotential to reach 10 and 20 mA cm(-2) is 34 and 43 mV, respectively. These values are lowest among the reported non-precious metal phosphides on CC. The Tafel slope for FeP prepared at 300 °C is around 29.2 mV dec(-1), which is comparable to that of Pt/CC; this indicates that the hydrogen evolution for our best FeP is limited by the Tafel reaction (same as Pt). Importantly, the FeP/CC catalyst exhibits much better stability in a wide-range working current density (up to 1 V cm(-2)), suggesting that it is a promising replacement of Pt for HER.