Designing Functional Soft Matter via Processing

A special issue of Processes (ISSN 2227-9717). This special issue belongs to the section "Materials Processes".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 November 2021) | Viewed by 7459

Special Issue Editors

Department of Polymer Science and Engineering, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, CAS Key Laboratory of Soft Matter Chemistry, University of Science and Technology of China, 96 Jinzhai Road, Hefei 230026, China
Interests: polymers; supramolecular materials; stimuli-responsive materials; photoresponsive polymers; photochemistry; polymer nanocomposite; upconversion
Department of Applied Chemistry, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China
Interests: polymer electrolytes; membranes; membrane separation; ions transport; fuel cells; electrodialysis

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

We invite you to submit to this Special Issue of Processes focused on “Designing Functional Soft Matter”. Functional soft matter, including polymers, liquid crystals, membranes, gels, colloids, and nanomaterials, has attracted a lot of interest because of its fundamental importance and technological applications. By designing structures and processing materials in proper ways, soft materials with user-defined functions can be prepared. This Special Issue seeks novel contributions in, but not limited to, the following areas:

  • Design of functional soft matter such as polymers, liquid crystals, membranes, gels, colloids, nanomaterials, etc.
  • Simulation, control, and optimization of functional soft matter
  • Detailed analysis and characterization of functional soft matter
  • Synthesis of functional soft matter
  • Processing of functional soft matter
  • Functions of soft matter: stimuli-responsiveness, separation, mechanical properties, self-assembly, optical properties, luminescence properties, electronic properties, magnetic properties, and other functions
  • Soft matter for practical applications

We look forward to your submissions.

Thank you,

Prof. Dr. Si Wu
Prof. Dr. Liang Wu
Guest Editors

Manuscript Submission Information

Manuscripts should be submitted online at www.mdpi.com by registering and logging in to this website. Once you are registered, click here to go to the submission form. Manuscripts can be submitted until the deadline. All submissions that pass pre-check are peer-reviewed. Accepted papers will be published continuously in the journal (as soon as accepted) and will be listed together on the special issue website. Research articles, review articles as well as short communications are invited. For planned papers, a title and short abstract (about 100 words) can be sent to the Editorial Office for announcement on this website.

Submitted manuscripts should not have been published previously, nor be under consideration for publication elsewhere (except conference proceedings papers). All manuscripts are thoroughly refereed through a single-blind peer-review process. A guide for authors and other relevant information for submission of manuscripts is available on the Instructions for Authors page. Processes is an international peer-reviewed open access monthly journal published by MDPI.

Please visit the Instructions for Authors page before submitting a manuscript. The Article Processing Charge (APC) for publication in this open access journal is 2400 CHF (Swiss Francs). Submitted papers should be well formatted and use good English. Authors may use MDPI's English editing service prior to publication or during author revisions.

Keywords

  • soft matter
  • polymer
  • liquid crystal
  • membrane
  • colloid
  • nanomaterial
  • gel
  • processing
  • function
  • synthesis
  • characterization
  • simulation

Published Papers (4 papers)

Order results
Result details
Select all
Export citation of selected articles as:

Research

11 pages, 4656 KiB  
Article
Preparation of Polymer Composite Selective Permeable Membrane with Graphene Oxide and Application for Chemical Protective Clothing
by Haolin Du, Zenghe Li, Heguo Li, Yue Zhao, Xiaopeng Li, Jing Liu and Zuohui Ji
Processes 2022, 10(3), 471; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/pr10030471 - 25 Feb 2022
Cited by 5 | Viewed by 1690
Abstract
Chemical warfare agents (CWA) can poison people through the skin and cause injury, and the use of chemical protective clothing (CPC) is an important way to protect personnel from injury. CPC performance strongly depends on chemical protective materials, and satisfactory protective materials must [...] Read more.
Chemical warfare agents (CWA) can poison people through the skin and cause injury, and the use of chemical protective clothing (CPC) is an important way to protect personnel from injury. CPC performance strongly depends on chemical protective materials, and satisfactory protective materials must meet various requirements, including protective performance, physiological comfort, mechanical performance, and cost effectiveness. Here, low-cost materials were used to prepare PVDF sodium sulfonate composite membranes with different contents of modified graphene oxide (GO-SSS). Their tensile properties, contact angle, permeability, and selectivity were tested and analyzed. The results show that when the addition ratio of GO-SSS to the bare membrane is 0.5%, the composite membrane has desirable permeation selectivity of water vapor/CWA simulant vapor and desirable mechanical properties. Hence, our sodium sulfonate composite membrane of PVDF with GO-SSS is an ideal material for potential applications in CPC. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Designing Functional Soft Matter via Processing)
Show Figures

Figure 1

10 pages, 3609 KiB  
Article
Porous Anion Exchange Membrane for Effective Acid Recovery by Diffusion Dialysis
by Jinbei Yang, Guangkai Dai, Jing Wang, Shuai Pan, Gang Lu, Xiaoke Shi, Danni Tang, Jinyi Chen and Xiaocheng Lin
Processes 2021, 9(6), 1049; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/pr9061049 - 16 Jun 2021
Cited by 10 | Viewed by 1814
Abstract
Diffusion dialysis (DD) employing anion exchange membranes (AEMs) presents an attractive opportunity for acid recovery from acidic wastewater. However, challenges exist to make highly acid permeable AEMs due to their low acid dialysis coefficient (Uacid). Here, a [...] Read more.
Diffusion dialysis (DD) employing anion exchange membranes (AEMs) presents an attractive opportunity for acid recovery from acidic wastewater. However, challenges exist to make highly acid permeable AEMs due to their low acid dialysis coefficient (Uacid). Here, a series of porous and highly acid permeable AEMs fabricated based on chloromethyl polyethersulfone (CMPES) porous membrane substrate with crosslinking and quaternization treatments is reported. Such porous AEMs show high Uacid because of the large free volume as well as the significantly reduced ion transport resistance relative to the dense AEMs. Compared with the commercial dense DF-120 AEM, our optimal porous AEM show simultaneous 466.7% higher Uacid and 75.7% higher acid/salt separation factor (Sacid/salt) when applied to acid recovery at the same condition. Further, considering the simple and efficient fabrication process as well as the low cost, our membranes show great prospects for practical acid recovery from industrial acidic wastewater. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Designing Functional Soft Matter via Processing)
Show Figures

Figure 1

15 pages, 4151 KiB  
Article
Selective Adsorption of CR (VI) onto Amine-Modified Passion Fruit Peel Biosorbent
by Xiaolei Zhao, Junli Zheng, Shaohong You, Linlin Du, Chongmin Liu, Kaiwei Chen, Yuanli Liu and Lili Ma
Processes 2021, 9(5), 790; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/pr9050790 - 30 Apr 2021
Cited by 14 | Viewed by 1909
Abstract
This study aimed to prepare surface amino-riched passion fruit peel (DAPFP) by amination reaction with low-cost biomaterials and use it as a biosorbent to adsorb Cr (VI). The specific physicochemical and structural properties of DAPFP were characterized by SEM, EDS, XRD, TG, Zeta, [...] Read more.
This study aimed to prepare surface amino-riched passion fruit peel (DAPFP) by amination reaction with low-cost biomaterials and use it as a biosorbent to adsorb Cr (VI). The specific physicochemical and structural properties of DAPFP were characterized by SEM, EDS, XRD, TG, Zeta, XPS, and FT-IR. The effects of pH value, initial concentration, adsorption time, coexisting ions, and temperature on the adsorption of Cr (VI) were systematically investigated. The results showed that within 90 min, DAPFP could reduce the concentration of Cr (VI) solution (1 mg/L−1) to an allowable safe level of drinking water (0.05 mg/L−1) specified by the World Health Organization. The adsorption process complies with pseudo-second-order kinetics and the Langmuir isotherm model. The adsorption capacity of the prepared biosorbent could reach 675.65 mg/g−1. The results of thermodynamic studies confirmed that the adsorption process was a self-discharging heat process. DAPFP also showed good reusability; even after being used repeatedly five times, it still showed excellent adsorption performance. FT-IR and XPS analyses showed that electrostatic attraction and reduction were the main reasons for the adsorption. By virtue of its low cost and excellent adsorption performance, DAPFP has a potential practical application as an adsorbent in treating Cr (VI) containing wastewater. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Designing Functional Soft Matter via Processing)
Show Figures

Figure 1

10 pages, 3878 KiB  
Article
Whispering-Gallery-Mode for Coherent Random Lasing in a Dye-Doped Polystyrene Encapsulated Silica-Glass Capillary
by Kai Nie, Yueqi Wang, Zhenzhen Zhang, Gang Zou, Xiaolong Xu, Zhijia Hu and Qijin Zhang
Processes 2020, 8(12), 1578; https://0-doi-org.brum.beds.ac.uk/10.3390/pr8121578 - 30 Nov 2020
Cited by 1 | Viewed by 1504
Abstract
Dye-doped polystyrene (DDPS) encapsulated in a silica-glass capillary with a diameter of 300 μm was fabricated through radical polymerization of styrene within the capillary. The coherent random lasing (RL) with full width at half maximum (FWHM) of 0.36 nm and a quality factor [...] Read more.
Dye-doped polystyrene (DDPS) encapsulated in a silica-glass capillary with a diameter of 300 μm was fabricated through radical polymerization of styrene within the capillary. The coherent random lasing (RL) with full width at half maximum (FWHM) of 0.36 nm and a quality factor of 1608 was produced in the DDPS with the capillary when pumping at 532 nm. However, the incoherent RL with FWHM of 6.62 nm and a quality factor of 92 was produced in the DDPS without the capillary. A detailed investigation on this phenomenon by changing the diameter of the capillary and core refractive index (RI) reveals that there exists a strong whispering gallery mode (WGM) resonance in the capillary, which helps generate the coherent RL. The findings may open up a new approach for the fabrication of highly efficient photonic devices. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Designing Functional Soft Matter via Processing)
Show Figures

Figure 1

Back to TopTop