Non-Halogenated-Solvent Processed and Additive-Free Tandem Organic Solar Cell with Efficiency Reaching 16.67%

Organic solar cells (OSCs) have recently reached a remarkably high efficiency and become a promising technology for commercial application. However, OSCs with top efficiency are mostly processed by halogenated solvents and with additives that are not environmentally friendly, which hinders large-scale manufacture. In this study, high-performance tandem OSCs, based on polymer donors and two small-molecule acceptors with different bandgaps, are fabricated by solution processing with non-halogenated solvents without additive. Importantly, the two active layers developed from non-halogenated solvents show better phase segregation and charge transport properties, leading to superior performance than halogenated ones. As a result, a tandem OSC with high efficiency of up to 16.67% is obtained, showing unique advantages in future massive production.     

Targeted Delivery of Anesthetic Agents to Bone Tissues using Conductive Microneedles Enhanced Iontophoresis for Painless Dental Anesthesia

Pain management during dental procedures is a cornerstone for successful daily practice. In current practice, the traditional needle and syringe injection is used to administer local anesthesia. However, the appearance of long needles and the pain associated with it often leads to dental anxiety deterring timely interventions. Microneedles (MNs) have emerged as a minimally invasive alternative to hypodermic needles and shown to be effective in transdermal drug delivery applications. In this article, the potential use of MNs for local anesthesia delivery in dentistry is explored. The development of a novel conductive MN array that can be used in combination with iontophoresis technique to achieve drug penetration through the oral mucosa and the underlying bone tissue is presented. The conductive MN array plays a dual-role, creating micro-conduits and lowering the resistance of the oral mucosa. The reduced tissue resistance further enhances the application of a low-voltage current that is able to direct and accelerate the drug molecules to target the sensory nerves supplying teeth. The successful delivery of lidocaine using this new strategy in a clinically relevant rabbit incisor model is shown to be as effective as the current gold standard.     

Epitaxial Growth of 2D Materials on High-Index Substrate Surfaces

Recently, the successful synthesis of wafer-scale single-crystal graphene, hexagonal boron nitride (hBN), and MoS₂ on transition metal surfaces with step edges boosted the research interests in synthesizing wafer-scale 2D single crystals on high-index substrate surfaces. Here, using hBN growth on high-index Cu surfaces as an example, a systematic theoretical study to understand the epitaxial growth of 2D materials on various high-index surfaces is performed. It is revealed that hBN orientation on a high-index surface is highly dependent on the alignment of the step edges of the surface as well as the surface roughness. On an ideal high-index surface, well-aligned hBN islands can be easily achieved, whereas curved step edges on a rough surface can lead to the alignment of hBN along with different directions. This study shows that high-index surfaces with a large step density are robust for templating the epitaxial growth of 2D single crystals due to their large tolerance for surface roughness and provides a general guideline for the epitaxial growth of various 2D single crystals.     

Thiol-Functionalized Covalent Organic Frameworks as Thermal History Indictor for Temperature and Time History Monitoring

Various products, including foods and pharmaceuticals, are sensitive to temperature fluctuations. Thus, temperature monitoring during production, transportation, and storage is critical. Facile indicators are required to monitor temperature conditions via color changes in real time. This study aimed to prepare and apply thiol-functionalized covalent organic frameworks (COFs) as a novel indicator for monitoring thermal history and temperature abuse. The COFs underwent obvious color changes from bright yellow to purple after exposure to different temperatures for varying durations. The reaction kinetics are analyzed under isothermal conditions, which reveal that the order of reaction rates is k_−20°C < k_4°C < k_20°C < k_35°C < k_55°C. The activation energy (E_a) of the COFs is calculated using the Arrhenius equation as 50.71 kJ moL⁻¹. The COFs are capable of sensitive color changes and offer a broad temperature tracking range, thereby demonstrating their application potential for the monitoring of temperature and time exposure history during production, transportation, and storage. This excellent performance thermal history indicator also shows promise for expanding the application field of COFs.     

Synthesis,Anticancer Activity,Structure-Activity Relationship and Mechanistic Investigations of Falcarindiol Analogues

Forty samples of optically active falcarindiol analogues are synthesized by using the easily available C2 symmetric (R)- and (S)-1,1’-binaphth-2-ol (BINOL) in combination with Ti(OⁱPr)₄, Zn powder and EtI. Their anticancer activities on Hccc-9810, HepG2, MDA-MB-231, Hela, MG-63 and H460 cells are assayed to elucidate their structure-activity relationships. These results showed that the falcarindiol analogue (3R,8S)- 2 i with the terminal double bond has the most potent anti-proliferation effect on Hccc-9810 cells with IC₅₀ value of 0.46 μM. The falcarindiol analogue (3R,8S)- 2 i can induce obvious Hccc-9810 cell apoptosis in a concentration-dependent manner by Hoechst staining and flow cytometry analysis. The proposed mechanism suggests that the falcarindiol analogue (3R,8S)- 2 i increases LDH release and MDA content, and reduces the levels of SOD activity, which lead to the accumulation of oxidative stress and induce apoptosis in Hccc-9810 cells.     

工艺参数对动态流量控制法挤压弯管应力的影响

采用有限元模拟和实验研究了挤压钛合金弯曲管件。通过实验验证了工件的形状和尺寸精度,并通过有限元模拟分析了工艺参数对挤出过程中变形体的平均压应力分布情况和挤出弯管件的曲率半径的影响规律。结果表明:有限元模拟中,弯管件的曲率半径误差为6.03%,弯管直径误差为3.82%;在靠近定径带处,平均压应力呈非均匀分布;在焊合腔内,靠近细分流孔区域的平均压应力小于靠近粗分流孔区域的平均压应力,平均压应力的大小顺序在通过粗、细分流孔前后相反;在模具结构固定不变时,弯管件的曲率半径随挤压速度的减小而增大,不随挤压温度的变化而变化。     

An integrated dimensionality reduction and surrogate optimization approach for plant-wide chemical process operation

With liquefied natural gas becoming increasingly prevalent as a flexible source of energy, the design and optimization of industrial refrigeration cycles becomes even more important. In this article, we propose an integrated surrogate modeling and optimization framework to model and optimize the complex CryoMan Cascade refrigeration cycle. Dimensionality reduction techniques are used to reduce the large number of process decision variables which are subsequently supplied to an array of Gaussian processes, modeling both the process objective as well as feasibility constraints. Through iterative resampling of the rigorous model, this data-driven surrogate is continually refined and subsequently optimized. This approach was not only able to improve on the results of directly optimizing the process flow sheet but also located the set of optimal operating conditions in only 2 h as opposed to the original 3 weeks, facilitating its use in the operational optimization and enhanced process design of large-scale industrial chemical systems.     

Additive Manufacturing of Stable Energy Storage Devices Using a Multinozzle Printing System

The development of the Internet of things has prompted an exponential increase in the demand for flexible, wearable devices, thereby posing new challenges to their integration and conformalization. Additive manufacturing facilitates the fabrication of complex parts via a single integrated process. Herein, the development of a multinozzle, multimaterial printing device is reported. This device accommodates the various characteristics of printing materials, ensures high-capacity printing, and can accommodate a wide range of material viscosities from 0 to 1000 Cp. Complete capacitors, inclusive of the current collector, electrode, and electrolyte, can be printed without repeated clamping to complete the preheating, printing, and sintering processes. This method addresses the poor stability issue associated with printed electrode materials. Furthermore, after the intercalation of LiFePO₄ with Na ions, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and X-ray diffraction results reveal that the Na ions permeate the interlayer structure of LiFePO₄, enhancing the ion migration channels by increasing the ion transmission rate. A current rate of 2.5 mAh ensures >2000 charge/discharge cycles, while retaining a charge/discharge efficiency of 96% and a discharge capacity of 91.3 mAh g⁻¹. This manufacturing process can provide conformal power modules for a diverse range of portable devices with various shapes, improving space utilization.     

Toward High-Performance Dihydrophenazine-Based Conjugated Microporous Polymer Cathodes for Dual-Ion Batteries through Donor–Acceptor Structural Design

Recent studies have demonstrated that dihydrophenazine (Pz) with high redox-reversibility and high theoretical capacity is an attractive building block to construct p-type polymer cathodes for dual-ion batteries. However, most reported Pz-based polymer cathodes to date still suffer from low redox activity, slow kinetics, and short cycling life. Herein, a donor–acceptor (D–A) Pz-based conjugated microporous polymer (TzPz) cathode is constructed by integrating the electron-donating Pz unit and the electron-withdrawing 2,4,6-triphenyl-1,3,5-triazine (Tz) unit into a polymer chain. The D–A type structure enhances the polymer conjugation degree and decreases the band gap of TzPz, facilitating electron transportation along the polymer skeletons. Therefore the TzPz cathode for dual-ion battery shows a high reversible capacity of 192 mAh g⁻¹ at 0.2 A g⁻¹ with excellent rate performance (108 mAh g⁻¹ at 30 A g⁻¹), which is much higher than that of its counterpart polymer BzPz produced from 1,3,5-triphenylbenzene (Bz) and Pz (148 and 44 mAh g⁻¹ at 0.2 and 10 A g⁻¹, respectively). More importantly, the TzPz cathode also shows a long and stable cyclability of more than 10 000 cycles. These results demonstrate that the D–A structural design is an efficient strategy for developing high-performance polymer cathodes for dual-ion batteries.     

A Biologically Muscle-Inspired Polyurethane with Super-Tough,Thermal Reparable and Self-Healing Capabilities for Stretchable Electronics

Polymeric elastomers play an increasingly important role in the development of stretchable electronics. A highly demanded elastic matrix is preferred to own not only excellent mechanical properties, but also additional features like high toughness and fast self-healing. Here, a polyurethane (DA-PU) is synthesized with donor and acceptor groups alternately distributed along the main chain to achieve both intra-chain and inter-chain donor-acceptor self-assembly, which endow the polyurethane with toughness, self-healing, and, more interestingly, thermal repair, like human muscle. In detail, DA-PU exhibits an amazing mechanical performance with elongation at break of 1900% and toughness of 175.9 MJ m⁻³. Moreover, it shows remarkable anti-fatigue and anti-stress relaxation properties as manifested by cyclic tensile and stress relaxation tests, respectively. Even in case of large strain deformation or long-time stretch, it can almost completely restore to original length by thermal repair at 60 °C in 60 s. The self-healing speed of DA-PU is gradually enhanced with the increasing temperature, and can be 1.0–6.15 µm min⁻¹ from 60 to 80 °C. At last, a stretchable and self-healable capacitive sensor is constructed and evaluated to prove that DA-PU matrix can ensure the stability of electronics even after critical deformation and cut off.