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Herein, fishbone-like poly(methyl eleostearate) (PME) plasticizer with high biobased content of near 90% was developed for the production of flexible poly(vinyl chloride) (PVC) by the green cationi...

Developing three-dimensional porous hydrophobic and oleophilic materials (3D-PHOMs) for efficient and selective oil-water separation is important to clean up oil spills and organic pollutants. However, 3D-PHOMs are still confined to lab-scale research due to several crucial drawbacks. Herein, a hydrophobic oil-water separation composite, containing cellulose nanofiber (delignificated porous wood, PW) substrate, magnetic nickel (Ni) layer and hydrophobic polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) coating, is prepared using electroless deposition (ELD) and surface modification techniques. Owing to the porosity, hydrophobicity (>130° of water contact angle), lipophilicity, convenient magnetic collection and high cycle compressibility, the as-fabricated PDMS-Ni-PW exhibits excellent oil adsorption capacity (>60% of the volumetric absorption capacity) and outstanding cyclic stability (>80% of the adsorption capacity after 200 cycles). Thanks to the low surface energy and rough surface structure, the adsorbent demonstrates superior oil-retention ability (>80% at 200 rpm). Also, the oil-collecting apparatus is successfully designed to continuously separate various oils, e.g., n-hexane and dichloromethane, from water due to the unidirectional liquid transport of the adsorbent. These excellent properties make PDMS-modified cellulose nanofiber a promising candidate for oil-water separation.

The facile and low-cost fabrication of free-standing magnetic catalysts with high catalytic efficiency, rapid reaction rate and excellent recoverability has been pursued for various catalysis applications, e.g., treating aqueous organic 4-nitrophenol pollutants. Here, we design and fabricate a free-standing nickel-coated hyperporous polymer foam (Ni-HPF) with adjustable shapes and sizes, hierarchical multiscale porous structures, abundant catalytical interfaces and excellent super-paramagnetic properties. Due to the synergistical effect of abundant binding sites and highly catalytic reduction, the as-prepared Ni-HPF has demonstrated high conversion efficiency (> 90% at extremely low concentration of 7.5 μM) and rapid reaction rate (2.58 × 10−3 s−1) for the reduction of organic 4-nitrophenol. Moreover, the magnetic catalyst also holds excellent recoverability (>80% conversion rate even after 1000 cycles) and good reproducibility (>80% conversion rate after 3 months of storage). As such, this work with novel material design and working principle could provide a wide range of potential applications in water purification, chemical catalysis and energy storage devices.

Materials with high bio-content have gradually replaced petroleum-based materials due to their sustainability, low cost, low toxicity and excellent performance in the field of UV-LED curable coatings. A novel tung oil-based methacrylate (TDMM) with low viscosity and multiple photopolymerizable methacrylates was designed and synthesized through three steps containing amidation, thiol-ene click reaction and esterification. The reaction conditions for thiol-ene click reaction were optimized by calculating double bond conversion and degree of functionalization of polyols. The chemical structures of the as-prepared TDMM were characterized by 1H NMR and FTIR. The rheological behavior analysis indicated that TDMM exhibited lower viscosity than petrochemical-based reactive diluent pentaerythritol triacrylate (PETA). Subsequently, TDMM showed good copolymerization ability with soybean oil-based reactive monomer (AESO) under the “green + green” UV-LED curable systems with high bio-content (61–81% in theory). The TDMM/AESO systems showed higher Tg but lower thermal stability, better modulus and tensile strength than the neat AESO. Besides, the UV-LED cured coatings exhibited excellent physical and chemical properties. This bio-renewable tung oil-based monomer is shown to be an effective reactive diluent and considered to have good potential in the development of the UV-LED curable coatings.

Heavy metal pollution has raised serious concerns due to the potential threat to public health and the environment. Adsorption is an important method for removing metal ions from wastewater, but many current adsorbents are limited by high cost, low adsorption efficiency and poor cyclability. Herein, a compressible composite (PEI-NW) with a porous structure is prepared by a simple chemical treatment of nanowood (NW) with polyethyleneimine (PEI). Modification of NW with PEI enables the efficient adsorption of metal ions. PEI-NW shows excellent adsorption efficiency. Adsorbed heavy metal ions can be rapidly desorbed by simply immersing PEI-NW in a desorption solution. PEI-NW can be reused by employing the squeezing method because of its excellent compressibility. The adsorbent can remove the heavy metal ions from polluted water with 60% of adsorption efficiency even after 50 adsorption-desorption cycles. This compressible composite provides new insights for the design of efficient cleaners for heavy metal ion removal and offers approaches to the development of functionalization of biomass-based composites.