Recent Progress of MXene-Based Nanomaterials in Flexible Energy Storage and Electronic Devices

The increasing demands for wearable electronics have stimulated the rapid development of flexible energy storage devices.MXenes are considered as promising flexible electrodes due to the ultrahigh volumetric specific capacitance,metallic conductivity,superior hydrophily,and rich surface chemistry.

Toward Enhancing Wearability and Fashion of Wearable Supercapacitor with Modified Polyurethane Artificial Leather Electrolyte

Inspired by the sophisticated artificial leather garment industry and toward enhancing wearability of energy storage devices, we demonstrate a polyurethane artificial leather supercapacitor with large sheet electrodes embedded in theleather layer simultaneously working as a polyelectrolyte. This design totally reserves textiles underneath and thus addresses the well-known challenge of wearing comfortability. It provides a revolutionary configuration of wearable supercapacitors: the artificial leather on garment is also a supercapacitor.Unlike the polyvinyl alcohol-based acidic electrolytes, which are widely used, sodium chloride is used to modify the intrinsically fluorescent polyurethane leather for ionic transportation, which has no harm to human. The fluorescent leather supercapacitor is easily transferrable from any arbitrary substrates to form various patterns, enabling multifunctionalities of practical wearability, fashion, and energy storage.

Highly uniform Co-Cu bimetallic sulfides for rechargeable alkaline aqueous zinc batteries

Rechargeable alkaline aqueous zinc batteries(RAZBs)have attracted increasing attention.However,most RAZBs are hindered by the limited availability of cathode materials.The practical electrochemical performance of most cathode materials is lower than the theoretical value due to their poor electrical conductivity and low utilization capacity.In this work,we develop a facile hydrothermal procedure to prepare highly uniform bimetallic sulfides as novel cathode materials for RAZBs.Copper-cobalt binary metallic oxides materials possess higher conductivity and larger capacity compared with their mono-metal oxides compounds due to bimetallic synergistic effects and multiple oxidation states.Furthermore,bimetallic sulfide compounds have smaller bond energy and longer bond length than their oxides,leading to less structural damage,faster kinetics of electrochemical reactions,and better stability.The as-prepared Co-Cu bimetallic sulfides show enhanced electrochemical performance due to various valences of Co and Cu as well as the existence of S.As a result,aqueous Zn/CuCo_(2)S_(4) battery shows a high specific capacity of 117.4 mAh/g at 4 A/g and a good cycle life of over 8000 cycles.Based on PANa hydrogel electrolytes,a flexible Zn/CuCo_(2)S_(4) battery demonstrates excellent cycling stability.This battery can also meet the requirements of electronic devices with different shapes and performs well in extreme environments,such as freezing,drilling,and hammering.This work opens new avenues to obtain high-rate and long-life cathode materials for RAZBs by utilizing the synergistic effects of bimetallic sulfides and provides a new platform for flexible energy storage devices.

Self-healable electroluminescent devices

Electroluminescent(EL)devices have been extensively integrated into multi-functionalized electronic systems in the role of the vitally constituent light-emitting part.However,the lifetime and reliability of EL devices are often severely restricted by concomitant damage,especially when the strain exceeds the mechanical withstanding limit.We report a self-healable EL device by adopting a modified self-healable polyacrylic acid hydrogel as the electrode and a selfhealable polyurethane as a phosphor host to realize the first omni-layer-healable light-emitting device.The physicochemical properties of each functionalized layer can be efficiently restored after experiencing substantial catastrophic damage.As a result,the luminescent performance of the self-healable EL devices is well recovered with a high healing efficiency(83.2%for 10 healing cycles at unfixed spots,and 57.7%for 20 healing cycles at a fixed spot).In addition,inter-device healing has also been developed to realize a conceptual“LEGO”-like assembly process at the device level for light-emitting devices.The design and realization of the self-healable EL devices may revive their performance and expand their lifetime even after undergoing a deadly cut.Our self-healable EL devices may serve as model systems for electroluminescent applications of the recently developed ionically conductive healable hydrogels and dielectric polymers.

Effect of Alkyl Structures on the Anti-stacking and Anchoring of Pd/Diamine-Functionalized Graphene Nanoparticles in Application in Suzuki Reaction

Main observation and conclusion Three diamines(1,8-diaminooctane/p-phenylenediamine/biphenylenediamine)with different alkyl groups were used to synthesize the functionalized graphene networks.Pd as the common metal catalyst was used to explore the effects of alkyl types of diamines on anti-stacking,metal anchoring ability of functional graphene and hence the catalytic performance.The results were discussed by characterization of the material and its catalytic properties.All catalysts showed excellent catalytic performance on the Suzuki cross-coupling reaction with a high yield of up to 100%.The p-phenylenediamine and biphenylenediamine functionalized graphene with larger specific surface area was beneficial to improve the stability of the graphene catalyst and maintain good catalytic activity after 5 cycles.The Pd nanoparticles in 1,8-octanediamine materials have smaller size and a smaller loading with the same or even better catalytic performance than p-phenylenediamine,biphenylenediamine materials,due to the stronger electron donating ability of N of octanediamine than that of p-phenylenediamine.