Applications of Lamellar Membranes Reconstructed from Clay Mineral-Based Nanosheets: A Review

Abstract

Owing to their abundance, ecofriendliness, and multifaceted properties, natural clay minerals are among the most trusted and widely utilized materials on earth. One of the most exciting and latest findings of these minerals is that their layers can be exfoliated into individual flakes and reassembled to produce freestanding and flexible membranes. A tremendous surge in the research related to the futuristic applications of lamellar membranes prepared by restacking exfoliated two-dimensional (2D) nanomaterials has been observed in recent years. In this review article, we aim to summarize the multidirectional progress of lamellar membranes prepared from natural clay minerals. Innovative strategies involved in the exfoliation of clay layers and fabrication of macroscopic membranes through various assembly techniques are highlighted with special emphasis on novel applications such as studying nanofluidic transport in strict 2D, fabrication of smart materials, carrying out chemical reactions under nanoscale confinement, harvesting blue energy, and molecular separation. The clay membranes also inherit extraordinary robustness from their parent minerals and hence open up novel avenues for unique combinations of delicate properties and extraordinary thermal and chemical stability such as hightemperature stable ionic conductors, thermally stable smart materials, and high-temperature energy devices. Exceptional properties imbued to natural clay minerals such as tunable surface wettability and water-assisted healing of physical damage and functional properties by exchanging their inherent interlayer cations are also discussed elaborately.

Self-powered ionic tactile sensors

“…75 Restacking 2D nanosheets is one of the convenient and cost-effective methods for the construction of a percolated network of nanochannels. 78,79 The net surface charge of the nanosheets constructing the nanochannels determines the type of ion migration through the nanochannels. 80 Due to the overlapping EDL inside the nanochannels, it exhibits surface chargegoverned ion transport; that is, the nanochannels facilitate the transport of counter-ions while repelling the co-ions.…”

Targeted development of sustainable green catalysts for regioselective acylation of aromatic ethers with carboxylic acidsviachlorosulfonic acid coated on poly(guanidine–triazine–sulfonamide) grafted quartz–γ-Fe2O3

“…[32][33][34] Clay minerals are classified based on their phyllosilicate groups, i.e., based on the arrangement of octahedral hydroxide and tetrahedral silicate sheets. [35][36][37] Quartz is a hard crystalline mineral composed of silica (SiO 2 ). 38 Quartz atoms are linked in a continuous framework of silicon-oxygen tetrahedra (SiO 4 ).…”

Renewable and Selective Vermiculite Fixed Bed for the Rare-Earth Dysprosium Recovery

“…Clay minerals are low-cost and ecofriendly materials that present exclusive properties such as high capillarity, a degree of swelling, and exceptional thermal and chemical stability, which favor their use in a wide range of applications, including environmental remediation. , Likewise, due to their excellent adsorption potential, clay-based adsorbents have a high regeneration capacity that also increases the sustainability of the process due to the possibility of reusing the adsorbent . Vermiculite, a natural clay mineral with a layered structure with two tetrahedral silica sheets fused to an edge shared octahedral sheet of magnesium, iron, or aluminum hydroxide, has been successfully applied to the consecutive adsorption and desorption of dysprosium in batch mode, which indicates the material’s potential for the fixed bed continuous operation.…”