Material dependence of cities and implications for regional sustainability

Cities rely on massive amounts of physical,chemical,and biological resources to support their growth and metabolism.These‘metabolic inputs’are accumulated in cities to form material stocks in buildings,infrastructures,transportation facilities,and household appliances.This study takes China’s urbanization as an example to illustrate the characteristics of material stock changes in developing countries and compare them with those in developed countries.Results show that(1)material stocks have been growing in China,but have saturated in developed countries,and(2)the major components of urban metabolism are construction and industrial materials(e.g.,steel)in developing countries but biomass(e.g.,food)in developed countries.The changes in the magnitude and types of material stocks can not only measure urban development but also directly link city and its residents,offering advantages in representing urbanization over the existing indices such as population,land use,or gross domestic product(GDP).Given the new insights provided by material stock,we recommend to embrace it as a critical index of urbanization for guiding urban planning and policy-making.

Nanomaterials for lubricating oil application:A review

Friction and wear are ubiquitous,from nano-electro-mechanical systems in biomedicine to large-scale integrated electric propulsion in aircraft carriers.Applications of nanomaterials as lubricating oil additives have achieved great advances,which are of great significance to control friction and wear.This review focuses on the applications of nanomaterials in lubricating oil and comprehensively compares their tribological characteristics as lubricating oil additives.Statistical analysis of tribology data is provided and discussed accordingly;moreover,the interaction between nanomaterials and sliding surface,lubricating oil,other additives,and synergistic lubrication in nanocomposites are systematically elaborated.Finally,suggestions for future research on nanomaterials as lubricating oil additives are proposed.Hence,this review will promote a better fundamental understanding of nanomaterials for lubricating oil application and help to achieve the superior design of nanoadditives with outstanding tribological performances.

Controllable synthesis of highly crystallized mesoporous TiO2/WO3 heterojunctions for acetone gas sensing

Mesoporous semiconducting metal oxides(SMOs)heterojunctions are appealing sensors for gas detecting.However,due to the different hydrolysis and condensation mechanism of every metal precursor and the contradiction between high crystallinity and high surface area,the synthesis of mesoporous SMOs heterojunctions with highly o rdered mesostructures,highly crystallized frameworks,and high surface area remains a huge challenge.In this work,we develop a novel"acid-base pair"adjusted solvent evaporation induced self-assembly(EISA)strategy to prepare highly crystallized ordered mesoporous TiO2/WO3(OM-TiO2/WO3)heterojunctions.The WCl6 and titanium isopropoxide(TIPO)are used as the precursors,respectively,which function as the"acid-base pair",enabling the coassembly with the structure directing agent(PEO-b-PS)into highly ordered meso structures.In addition,PEO-b-PS can be converted to rigid carbon which can protect the meso structures from collapse during the crystallization process.The resultant OM-TiO2/WO3 heterojunctions possess primitive cubic mesostructures,large pore size(~21.1 nm),highly crystalline frameworks and surface area(~98 m2/g).As a sensor for acetone,the obtained OM-TiO2/WO3 show excellent re sponse/recovery perfo rmance(3 s/5 s),good linear dependence,repeatability,selectivity,and long-term stability(35 days).

Nanostructured lubricant additives for titanium alloy:Lubrication by the solid-liquid interface with Coulomb repulsion

In this work,the advantage of Coulomb repulsion in the intermolecular forces experienced by molecules on the solid–liquid nanosized contact interface is taken,and the superior friction-reducing property of Cu_(3)(PO_(4))2·3H_(2)O(CuP)oil-based additives has been confirmed for titanium alloy.Three-dimensional(3D)CuP nanoflowers(CuP-Fs)with a strong capillary absorption effect are prepared to achieve the homogeneous mixing of solid CuP and lubricating oil.Lubrication by CuP-Fs additives for titanium alloy,friction coefficient(COF)can be reduced by 73.68%,and wear rate(WR)reduced by 99.69%.It is demonstrated that the extraordinary friction-reducing property is due to the repulsive solid–liquid interface with low viscous shear force originating from Coulomb repulsion between polar water molecules in CuP and non-polar oil molecules.However,any steric hindrance or connection between this repulsive solid–liquid interface will trigger the adhesion and increase the viscous shear force,for example,dispersant,hydrogen bondings,and shaky adsorbed water molecules.Besides,the lamellar thickness of CuP and the molecular size of lubricant both have a great influence on tribological properties.Here the lubrication mechanism based on interface Coulomb repulsion is proposed that may help broaden the scope of the exploration in low-friction nanomaterial design and new lubricant systems.