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Aerogel materials have wide research and application in the fields of thermal insulation and functional materials. Although graphene sheet has high strength in conventional graphene aerogels, the interaction between sheets is weak. The overall strength of graphene aerogels is not high enough. Aerogels, especially halloysite aerogels, have been successfully synthesised in recent years, but their electrical potential expansion is slightly insufficient. Therefore, in view of the enhancement of the mechanical properties of aerogels and the development of electrical potential, the idea of organic–inorganic hybrid (OIH) aerogel was proposed. Graphene halloysite OIH aerogel materials were prepared by graphene sheets and halloysite fibres. The preparation and microstructure of materials were characterised using Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscopy, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and nitrogen adsorption–desorption. Meanwhile, the mechanical properties of aerogels were also studied, and the stress transfer behaviour of aerogels was investigated by Raman spectroscopy. The results showed that the OIH aerogel was successfully obtained. The strength of the OIH aerogels was much higher than that of the mixture of graphene and halloysite aerogel. The OIH network aerogels had more effective stress transfer effect depending on the chemical bonds between the networks.

Specifically, visually, and quantitatively monitor copper ion (Cu2+) is critical in the area of biological and environmental detection. Herein, a ratiometric fluorescent probe with benzoxazole appended xanthenes skeleton was constructed and further employed to monitor Cu2+ in Hela cells, real water samples, and test strips. An easily distinguishable colorimetric (colorless to red) and fluorescence (green to red) change could be observed by naked eye under the portable UV lamp (365 nm) and the changes could be recovered by adding S2−. Furthermore, electrospinning technique was employed to fabricate a probe composited fluorescent sensing film (PMMA) for realizing the visual and recyclable monitoring of Cu2+, indicating that the probe-composited fluorescent sensing film has great potential for on-site and naked-eye detection of Cu2+ in practical.

A simple naphthofluorescein-based probe was designed and synthesized by a two-step method. As expected, there was a good linear relationship between fluorescence intensity (680 nm)/absorbance (640 nm) and H2S concentration in the range of 2.00–10.0 μM with a detection limit of 0.50 μM/0.10 μM (S/N = 3). This probe was applied to monitor H2S concentration in red wine samples. Furthermore, it was successfully used to image exogenous H2S in living Hela cells, indicating its potential application in biology and medicine.