Yifan Liu,Hang Jiang,Hongyuan Zhu,Zhenyu Guo,Shasha Yuan,Liguo Shen,Die Ling Zhao,Hongjun Lin
In this study, magnetic polydopamine-coated CoFe 2 O 4 composites (CoFe 2 O 4 @PDA) were strategically assembled onto a porous polymer substrate via a magnetic-field-assisted non-solvent induced phase separation (MNIPS) process to construct photoactive self-cleaning membranes for efficient oil–water separation. The synergistic integration of CoFe 2 O 4 and PDA not only enhanced surface hydrophilicity but also promoted photocatalytic activity, enabling visible-light-driven degradation of organic foulants and high membrane self-cleaning efficiency. Systematic characterizations confirmed that the applied magnetic field effectively regulated nanoparticle alignment on the membrane surface, generating a rough, hydrophilic structure with excellent underwater superoleophobicity. The optimized composite membrane achieved a pure water flux of 4266.0 L·m⁻²·h⁻¹·bar⁻¹, 1.95 times higher than that of the pristine substrate, while maintaining separation efficiencies above 99% for various oil-in-water emulsions. Complementary molecular dynamics simulations further demonstrated that CoFe 2 O 4 @PDA nanoparticles reorganize interfacial hydrogen-bond networks, reduce oil–water interfacial tension, and thus promoted permeance and oil rejection of membranes. Under visible-light irradiation, a flux recovery ratio exceeding 99.0% was maintained over five consecutive filtration and self-cleaning cycles, showing outstanding photo-regenerability. Mechanistic studies revealed that CoFe 2 O 4 @PDA significantly enhanced the generation of reactive oxygen species (•OH and •O 2 ⁻), facilitating foulant degradation and surface renewal. This work provides molecular-level understanding and a scalable strategy for designing next-generation photoactive membranes for sustainable oily wastewater treatment.
The combination of multidrug chemotherapy and photothermal therapy (PTT) enhances cancer therapeutic efficacy. Herein, we develop a simple and smart pH/NIR dual-stimulus-responsive degradable mesoporous CoFe2O4@PDA@ZIF-8 sandwich nanocomposite. The mesoporous CoFe2O4 core acts as T2-weighted magnetic resonance (MR) imaging probe, PTT agent, and loading platform of hydrophilic doxorubicin (DOX). A polydopamine (PDA) layer is used to avoid the premature leakage of DOX before arriving at tumor site, enhance PTT efficiency, and facilitate the integration of ZIF-8 (a kind of metal–organic framework). The ZIF-8 shell serves to encapsulate hydrophobic camptothecin (CPT) and as the switch for the pH and NIR stimulation-responsive release of the two drugs. Therefore, T2-weighted MR imaging-guided multidrug chemotherapy and PTT synergistic treatment is achieved. Two kinds of anticancer drugs, hydrophilic DOX and hydrophobic CPT, are successfully loaded in CoFe2O4 and ZIF-8, respectively, so no mutual interference between the two drugs exists. A unique two-stage stepwise release process is exhibited for CPT and DOX with an interval of 12 h to improve the anticancer efficacy under the acidic microenvironment of tumor tissue. NIR irradiation achieves the burst drug-release and PTT after laser stimulation, simultaneously. With this smart design, high drug concentration is achieved at the tumor site by quick release, especially for the therapeutic drugs that show nonlinear pharmacokinetics, and PTT is integrated efficiently. Furthermore, negligible biotoxicity and a remarkable synergic antitumor effect of the hybrid nanocomposites are validated by HepG2 cells and tumor-bearing mice as models. Our multidrug delivery-releasing composite improves tumor therapeutic efficiency significantly compared with a single-drug chemotherapy system. The simple multifunctional composite system can be applied as an effective platform for personal nanomedicine with diagnosis, smart drug delivery, and cancer treatment through its remarkable photothermal property and controllable multidrug release.