The rapid increase in the commercialization of electric vehicles and portable electronics has markedly raised the demand for lithium resources. Extracting lithium from brine has become a critical pathway to address future lithium production challenges. However, the lithium extraction efficiency of conventional technologies is limited by the low levels of Li + and the high Mg 2+ /Li + ratio present in brine. A method involving one-step electrolysis with a solid-state electrolyte has been introduced for the direct and efficient extraction of metallic lithium. Li 1.3 Al 0.3 Ti 1.7 (PO 4 ) 3 (LATP) is considered a highly promising selective membrane for large-scale lithium extraction from brine sources due to its low cost, excellent stability, and high ionic conductivity. Herein, LATP electrolytes were synthesized through the optimization of solid-state reaction conditions. The resulting LATP pellets exhibited a high relative density of 98.29 % and an impressive ionic conductivity of 3.88 × 10 −4 S cm −1 . The lithium extraction device utilizing LATP as a selective membrane achieved a remarkable current efficiency of 97.4 % and a high lithium production rate of 40.4 μg h −1 cm −2 . After lithium extraction process, the LATP pellets retained the ionic conductivity of 2.69 × 10 −4 S cm −1 and preserved the sodium super ion conductors (NASICON) crystal structure. This study presents an efficient Li + selective membrane for extracting lithium directly from natural brine.
In many applications, the optical cross sections of gold nanorods (AuNRs) are required to be tailored at a fixed target longitudinal surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) wavelength depending on the excitation source and the photodetector. In this work, we demonstrate the fine tailoring of optical cross sections of AuNRs at a fixed target resonance wavelength, on the basis of AuNR overgrowth using a binary surfactant mixture consisting of 5-bromosalicylic acid (BSA) and cetyltrimethylammonium bromide (CTAB). A systematic study was performed on the sum effects of the BSA concentration and the volume of the growth solution, which gives a formula for quantitative instructions. Based on the formula, we gave examples for the successful synthesis of AuNRs with different optical cross sections at target LSPR wavelengths. From simulation, a nonlinear relationship was further derived to understand the relationship between the aspect ratio and the width of the AuNRs at a target LSPR wavelength for the dimension design of AuNRs. The ratio of optical against physical cross sections was calculated and plotted as a function of the width. The results clearly indicate that AuNRs with a width of 30 nm possess the highest efficiency in terms of optical per physical cross section. Our study provides reliable methods for the synthesis, as well as guidelines for the dimension design of AuNRs, for use in a variety of applications.
In this study, we investigated the use of pipe growth rings from water distribution networks as a catalyst in heterogeneous Fenton-like oxidation processes. The major constituents of real pipe growth rings (α- and γ-FeOOH) were prepared and considered as a simulated growth ring (SGR). Its performance in removing 5-bromosalicylic acid (5-BSA), a novel phenolic halogenated disinfection byproduct , was examined. SGR exhibited strong catalytic ability and a certain degree of adsorption capacity. Under acidic conditions, the adsorption and oxidation efficiencies were 32.65% and 87.67%, respectively. Furthermore, 72.19% of 5-BSA could be oxidized even at pH 0 of 7. Kinetic characterizations at various temperatures revealed that both the adsorption and catalytic oxidation processes followed pseudo-second-order kinetic models and were surface-controlled with high activation energies (31.26 and 23.58 kJ mol −1 , respectively). Ecotoxicity analyses of the transformation products (TPs) showed that the SGR/H 2 O 2 system could effectively reduce the toxicity of 5-BSA. Moreover, the number of iron ions leaching from SGR was below 0.1 mg L −1 in all experiments. The results of this study support further investigation of using real pipe growth rings in off-line water treatment , as well water network contamination remediation.