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Exploration of the application prospects of cattail fibers (CFs) in natural composites, and other fields is important for the sustainable development of new, green, light-weight, functional biomass materials. In this study, the physical and chemical properties, micro/nano structure, and mechanical characteristics of CFs were investigated. The CFs have a low density (618.0 kg m -3 ). The results of transmission electron microscopy and tensile testing data indicated that the cattail trunk fiber (CTF) bundle is composed of parenchyma cells and solid stone cells, demonstrating high specific modulus (10.1 MPa∙m 3 ·kg -1 ) and high elongation at break (3.9%). In turn, the cattail branch fiber (CBF) bundle is composed of parenchyma cells with specific "half-honeycomb" shape. The inner diaphragms divide these cells into the open cavities. This structural feature endows the CTF bundles with stable structure, good oil absorption and storage capacities. The chemical component and the Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy analyses show that the CFs have higher lignin content (20.6%) and wax content (11.5%), which are conducive to the improvement of corrosion resistance, thermal stability and lipophilic-hydrophobic property of CF. Finally, the thermogravimetric analysis indicates that its final degradation temperature is 404.5 °C, which is beneficial to the increase in processability of CFs-reinforced composites., (Copyright © 2021. Published by Elsevier B.V.)

Calcium phosphate (Ca-P) is the most abundant biomineral in hard tissues with diverse microstructures, which in nature ensure a broad range of functionalities with virtually similar and simple chemical compositions. Artificial fabrication of rationally designed Ca-P materials with arbitrary microstructures is a long-standing challenge for inorganic chemists. Although DNA nanotechnology has been elegantly used to modulate the nanofabrication of inorganic materials because of its programmability, encoding customized Ca-P mineralization with high structural precision remains unachievable because of fast affinity-driven crystal growth. Herein, this long-standing ambition has been skillfully fulfilled by taking advantage of crystallization via a particle attachment (CPA) process. The derived hybrid materials not only well inherited the structural details encoded by the DNA template but also exhibited significantly enhanced mechanical strength, even after heating. Moreover, this method preserved preinstalled synthetic functionalities on the DNA surface, allowing for downstream site-specific modification.

Rapid and selective removal of micropollutants from water is important for the reuse of water resources. Despite hollow frameworks with specific functionalized porous walls for the selective adsorption based on a series of interactions, tailoring a stable shape of nanometer‐ and micrometer‐sized architectures for the removal of specific pollutants remains a challenge. Here, exactly controlled sheets, tubes, and spherical frameworks were presented from the crosslinking of supramolecular colloids in polar solvents. The frameworks strongly depended on the architecture of original supramolecular colloids. As the entropy of colloids increased, the initial laminar framework rolled up into hollow tubules, and then further curled into hollow spheres. These shape‐persistent frameworks showed unprecedented selectivity as well as specific recognition for the shape of pollutants, thus contributing to efficient pollutant separation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Despite the recent development of highly efficient and stable metal catalysts, conferral of regulatory characteristics to the catalytic reaction in heterogeneous systems remains a challenge. Novel supramolecular nanotubules were prepared by alternative stacking from trimeric macrocycles, which was found to be able to coordinate with Pd cations. The Pd complexes exhibited a high catalytic performance for C−C coupling reaction. Notably, the tubular catalyst was observed to be controlled by supramolecular reversible assembly and showed superior heterogeneous catalytic activity, which was maintained for a number of cycles or reuse under an aerobic environment. Furthermore, the supramolecular catalyst showed unprecedented selectivity for the multifunctional coupling reaction and was able to serve as a new constructor of asymmetrical compounds. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

ABSTRACT Manipulation of optical transmission using plasmonic nanostructures is a significant issue in applications related to ultra-compact optoelectronic devices. In this paper, we present a type of plasmonic frequency selective surface constructed with an ultrathin gold film (∼20 nm) with arrays of subwavelength holes. By means of modified nanosphere lithography, we fabricate the nanostructured gold films with scalable sizes and tunable transmission in the visible and near-infrared range. Moreover, electromagnetic simulations are performed and demonstrate good agreement with experimental results and further reveal the evolution of optical properties from the optically thick film to the ultrathin film. The research achievements will provide significant design guidance of ultrathin plasmonic frequency selective surface for future nanophotonic devices. © 2016 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. Microwave Opt Technol Lett 58:2171-2176, 2016 [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

DNA nanostructures, owing to their controllable and adaptable nature, have been considered as highly attractive nanoplatforms for biomedical applications in recent years. However, their use in the biological environment has been restricted by low cellular transfection efficiency in mammalian cells, weak stability under physiological conditions, and endonuclease degradation. Herein, we demonstrate an effective approach to facilitate fast transfection of DNA nanostructures and enhance their stability by encapsulating DNA origami with a biocompatible cationic protein (cHSA) via electrostatic interaction. The coated DNA origami is found to be stable under physiological conditions. Moreover, the cHSA coating could significantly improve the cellular transfection efficiency of DNA origami, which is essential for biological applications. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]