Growing Tiny Flowers of Organometallic Polymers along Carbon Nanotubes

Microbial synthesis of hollow porous Prussian blue@yeast microspheres and their synergistic enhancement of organic pollutant removal performance

In this work, Prussian blue nanoparticles (PB NPs) were in situ grown on S. cerevisiae cells via one-step hydrothermal synthesis and the as-prepared Prussian blue@yeast (PB@yeast) hybrids exhibited synergistic adsorption and Fenton catalytic activities. FE-SEM, XRD and BET analysis of the prepared samples confirmed the successful formation of hollow porous structured PB@yeast microspheres, while FT-IR and XPS spectra indicated the fine structures were occupied by both functional adsorptive and catalytic sites. The experimental results of adsorption coupled Fenton reaction of PB@yeast hybrid microspheres revealed that the functional groups on the cell wall and the active iron sites in PB framework were fully utilized due to the triple synergistic effects of adsorption-Fenton catalysis-adsorption sites regeneration, thus endowing synergistically enhanced performance in removal of the selected cationic methylene blue (MB), anionic Methyl Orange (MO) and fluorescent brightener 71 (CXT) in aqueous solution. The high Fenton catalytic efficiency was related to the improvement of adsorption, in which the enrichment of contaminant molecules on the outer and inner surface of the hollow porous microspheres could lower mass transfer resistance and shorten charge transport pathways, thereby introducing more efficient Fenton catalytic activity than PB NPs.

Metallopolymers for advanced sustainable applications

Since the development of metallopolymers, there has been tremendous interest in the applications of this type of materials. The interest in these materials stems from their potential use in industry as catalysts, biomedical agents in healthcare, energy storage and production as well as climate change mitigation. The past two decades have clearly shown exponential growth in the development of many new classes of metallopolymers that address these issues. Today, metallopolymers are considered to be at the forefront for discovering new and sustainable heterogeneous catalysts, therapeutics for drug-resistant diseases, energy storage and photovoltaics, molecular barometers and thermometers, as well as carbon dioxide sequesters. The focus of this review is to highlight the advances in design of metallopolymers with specific sustainable applications.