{"title":"Multifunctional carbon materials from rugose rose for energy storage and water purification","authors":"Peng-Hui Li, Hui Zhou, Wen-Juan Wu","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2447-8","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2447-8","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>With the advancement of social process, the resource problem is becoming more prominent, biomass materials come into being, and it is becoming more and more important to explore and prepare efficient and multifunctional biomass materials to alleviate the problems of energy storage and water pollution. In this paper, nitrogen-doped hierarchical porous carbon materials (NRRC) were produced by one-step carbonization of withered rose as raw material and melamine as nitrogen source with KOH-activated porosification. The resulting nitrogen-doped porous carbon material had the most abundant pores and the best microspherical graded pore structure, with a specific surface area of up to 1393 m<sup>2</sup>·g<sup>−1</sup>, a pore volume of 0.68 cm<sup>3</sup>·g<sup>−1</sup>, and a nitrogen-doped content of 5.52%. Electrochemical tests showed that the maximum specific capacitance of NRRC in the three-electrode system was 346.4 F·g<sup>−1</sup> (0.5 A·g<sup>−1</sup>), which was combined with favorable capacitance retention performance and cycling stability. The NRRC//NRRC symmetric supercapacitors were further assembled, and the maximum energy density of a single device was 23.88 Wh·kg<sup>−1</sup>, which still maintains excellent capacitance retention and cyclic charging/discharging stability. For example, the capacitance retention rate was always close to 96.27% with almost negligible capacitance loss after 10000 consecutive charge/discharge cycles (current density: 10 A·g<sup>−1</sup>). Regardless of the three-electrode or two-electrode system, the super capacitive performance of NRRC porous carbon materials was comparable to the electrochemical performance of many reported biomass porous carbon materials, which showed better energy storage advantages and practical application potential. In addition, NRRC porous carbon materials had excellent water purification ability. The dye adsorption test confirmed that NRRC had a high adsorption capacity (491.47 mg·g<sup>−1</sup>) for methylene blue. This undoubtedly also showed a potential and promising avenue for high value-added utilization of this material.\u0000</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 9","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-06-11","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141530406","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Efficient oxidation of monosaccharides to sugar acids under neutral condition in flow reactors with gold-supported activated carbon catalysts","authors":"Ziqin Gong, Zengyong Li, Xu Zeng, Fengxia Yue, Wu Lan, Chuanfu Liu","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2457-6","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2457-6","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>A significant reaction in the synthesis of biomass-based chemicals is the catalyst-based and targeted oxidation of monosaccharides into valuable sugar acids. In this study, an activated carbon supported gold catalyst was used to oxidize glucose and xylose to gluconic acid and xylonic acid under neutral condition. Optimization of reaction conditions for the catalysts was performed using both a batch reactor and a flow-through reactor. In a batch reactor, the yields of gluconic and xylonic acid reached 93% and 92%, respectively, at 90 °C within 180 min. In a flow reactor, both reactions reached a similar yield at 80 °C with the weight hourly space velocity of 47.1 h<sup>−1</sup>. The reaction kinetics were explored in the flow reactor. The oxidation of glucose and xylose to gluconic and xylonic acid followed a first-order kinetics and the turnover frequency was 0.195 and 0.161 s<sup>−1</sup>, respectively. The activation energy was evaluated to be 60.58 and 59.30 kJ·mol<sup>−1</sup>, respectively. This study presents an environmentally friendly and feasible method for the selective oxidation of monosaccharides using an activated carbon supported gold catalyst, benefiting the high-value application of carbohydrates.\u0000</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 9","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-06-10","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141361856","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Synthetic auxotrophs accelerate cell factory development through growth-coupled models","authors":"Liangpo Li, Linwei Yu, Xinxiao Sun, Qipeng Yuan, Xiaolin Shen, Jia Wang","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2454-9","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2454-9","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>The engineering of microbial cell factories for the production of high-value chemicals from renewable resources presents several challenges, including the optimization of key enzymes, pathway fluxes and metabolic networks. Addressing these challenges involves the development of synthetic auxotrophs, a strategy that links cell growth with enzyme properties or biosynthetic pathways. This linkage allows for the improvement of enzyme properties by <i>in vivo</i> directed enzyme evolution, the enhancement of metabolic pathway fluxes under growth pressure, and remodeling of metabolic networks through directed strain evolution. The advantage of employing synthetic auxotrophs lies in the power of growth-coupled selection, which is not only high-throughput but also labor-saving, greatly simplifying the development of both strains and enzymes. Synthetic auxotrophs play a pivotal role in advancing microbial cell factories, offering benefits from enzyme optimization to the manipulation of metabolic networks within single microbes. Furthermore, this strategy extends to coculture systems, enabling collaboration within microbial communities. This review highlights the recently developed applications of synthetic auxotrophs as microbial cell factories, and discusses future perspectives, aiming to provide a practical guide for growth-coupled models to produce value-added chemicals as part of a sustainable biorefinery.\u0000</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 9","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-06-06","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141258644","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Enhanced bioethanol production from sugarcane bagasse: combination of liquid hot water and deep eutectic solvent pretreatment for optimized enzymatic saccharification","authors":"Xiaoling Xian, Biying Li, Shiyong Feng, Jiale Huang, Xinyuan Fu, Ting Wu, Xiaoqing Lin","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2438-9","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2438-9","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>In the present study, a sustainable pretreatment methodology combining liquid hot water and deep eutectic solvent is proposed for the efficient fractionation of hemicellulose, cellulose, and lignin from sugarcane bagasse, thereby facilitating the comprehensive utilization of both C5 and C6 sugars. The application of this combined pretreatment strategy to sugarcane bagasse led to notable enhancements in enzymatic saccharification and subsequent fermentation. Experiment results demonstrate that liquid hot water-deep eutectic solvent pretreatment yielded 85.05 ± 0.66 g·L<sup>−1</sup> of total fermentable sugar (glucose: 60.96 ± 0.21 g·L<sup>−1</sup>, xylose: 24.09 ± 0.87 g·L<sup>−1</sup>) through enzymatic saccharification of sugarcane bagasse. Furthermore, fermentation of the pretreated sugarcane bagasse hydrolysate yielded 34.33 ± 3.15 g·L<sup>−1</sup> of bioethanol. These findings confirm the effectiveness of liquid hot water-deep eutectic solvent pretreatment in separating lignocellulosic components, thus presenting a sustainable and promising pretreatment method for maximizing the valuable utilization of biomass resources.\u0000</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 8","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-06-04","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141387179","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Yu Zhang, Yulei Qian, Zhenye Tong, Su Yan, Xiaoyu Yong, Yang-Chun Yong, Jun Zhou
{"title":"Interfacing biosynthetic CdS with engineered Rhodopseudomonas palustris for efficient visible light-driven CO2–CH4 conversion","authors":"Yu Zhang, Yulei Qian, Zhenye Tong, Su Yan, Xiaoyu Yong, Yang-Chun Yong, Jun Zhou","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2460-y","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2460-y","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Engineered photosynthetic bacterium <i>Rhodo-pseudomonas palustris</i> is excellent at one-step CO<sub>2</sub> biomethanation and can use near-infrared light sources, overcoming the limitations of conventional photosynthetic systems. The current study constructed a biohybrid system that deposited CdS nanoparticles on <i>R. palustris</i>. This biohybrid system broadens the capture of sustainable solar energy, achieving a 155 nmol·mL<sup>−1</sup> biological CH<sub>4</sub> production under full visible light irradiation, 13.4-fold of that by the pure <i>R. palustris</i>. The transcriptome profiles revealed that gene expression related to photosynthetic electron transfer chain, nitrogenase, nanofilaments, and redox stress defense was activated. Accordingly, we attributed the much-enhanced CO<sub>2</sub> biomethanation in the biohybrid system to the remarkable increase in the intracellular reducing power and the stronger rigidity of the cells assisted by photoexcited electrons from CdS nanoparticles. Our discovery offers insight and a promising strategy for improving the current CO<sub>2</sub>–CH<sub>4</sub> biomanufacturing system.\u0000</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 10","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-06-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141388793","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Inter-chromosomal insertions into wild-type chromosomes induced by SCRaMbLE","authors":"Sijie Zhou, Junyanrui Li, Xichen Cui, Ying Wang, Ying-Jin Yuan","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2458-5","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2458-5","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Genomic rearrangements play a crucial role in shaping biological phenotypic diversity and driving species evolution. Synthetic chromosome rearrangement and modification by LoxP-mediated evolution (SCRaMbLE) has been applied to explore large-scale genomic rearrangements, yet it has been observed that these rearrangements occur exclusively in genomic regions containing loxPsym sites. Here, we found that SCRaMbLE of synthetic yeast harboring synthetic chromosome V and X can generate a variety of synthetic segment insertions into wild-type chromosomes, ranging from 1 to 300 kb. Furthermore, it was revealed that the novel insertions impacted the transcriptional level of neighboring regions and affected the production of exemplar pathway of zeaxanthin. Collectively, our results improve the understanding of the ability of SCRaMbLE to generate complex structural variations in nonsynthetic regions and provide a potential model to explore genomic transposable events.\u0000</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 9","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-06-03","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141389117","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Xikai Lu, Chunyan Zhang, Meng Wu, Wenjie Liu, Bin Xue, Chao Yao, Xiazhang Li
{"title":"Construction of spinel/biochar film/honeycomb monolithic catalyst for photothermal catalytic oxidation of VOCs","authors":"Xikai Lu, Chunyan Zhang, Meng Wu, Wenjie Liu, Bin Xue, Chao Yao, Xiazhang Li","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2453-x","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2453-x","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Photothermal catalytic oxidation emerges as a promising method for the removal of volatile organic compounds (VOCs). Herein, via sol-gel impregnation method, spinel CuMn<sub>2</sub>O<sub>4</sub> was coated on attapulgite honeycombs with integrating biochar (BC) film as the second carrier, using chestnut shell as complexation agent. Various mass ratios of CuMn<sub>2</sub>O<sub>4</sub> to chestnut shell was modulated to investigate the catalytic toluene degradation performance. Results indicated that the monolithic CuMn<sub>2</sub>O<sub>4</sub>/BC/honeycomb catalyst demonstrated superior photothermal catalytic toluene degradation with a low T<sub>90</sub> (temperature at 90% degradation) of 263 °C when the mass ratio of CuMn<sub>2</sub>O<sub>4</sub> to biomass was 1:4. The addition of BC film substantially increased the honeycomb’s specific surface area and improved the photothermal conversion of spinel, leading to enhanced photothermal catalytic activity. This study presents a cost-effective strategy for eliminating industrial VOCs using clay-biomass based monolithic catalyst.\u0000</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 9","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-05-31","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141171498","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
{"title":"Post-treatment of Ti-MWW zeolite with potassium fluoride for propylene epoxidation","authors":"Xintong Li, Xianchen Gong, Jilong Wang, Shengbo Jin, Hao Xu, Peng Wu","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2441-1","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2441-1","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Epoxidation of propylene to propylene oxide (PO) with hydrogen peroxide (HPPO) is an environmentally friendly and cost-efficient process in which titanosilicates are used as catalysts. Ti-MWW is a potential industrial catalyst for this process, which involves the addition of HPPO to PO. The silanol groups generated during secondary crystallization unavoidably result in ring-opening of PO and inefficient decomposition of HPPO, which diminish the PO selectivity and the lifespan of Ti-MWW. To address this issue, we conducted post-treatment modifications of the structured Bf-Ti-MWW catalyst with potassium fluoride aqueous solutions. By quenching the silanol groups with potassium fluoride and implanting electron-withdrawing fluoride groups into the Ti-MWW framework, both the catalytic activity and HPPO utilization efficiency were increased. Moreover, the ring opening reaction of PO was prohibited. In a continuous fixed-bed liquid-phase propylene epoxidation reaction, the KF-treated structured Ti-MWW catalyst displayed an exceptionally long lifespan of 2700 h, with a PO yield of 590 g·kg<sup>−1</sup>·h<sup>−1</sup>.</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 8","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-05-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141171439","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Ruishuang Sun, Chenqi Cao, Qingyun Wang, Hui Cao, Ulrich Schwaneberg, Yu Ji, Luo Liu, Haijun Xu
{"title":"Enzymatic C1 reduction using hydrogen in cofactor regeneration","authors":"Ruishuang Sun, Chenqi Cao, Qingyun Wang, Hui Cao, Ulrich Schwaneberg, Yu Ji, Luo Liu, Haijun Xu","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2431-3","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2431-3","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Carbon dioxide fixation presents a potential solution for mitigating the greenhouse gas issue. During carbon dioxide fixation, C1 compound reduction requires a high energy supply. Thermodynamic calculations suggest that the energy source for cofactor regeneration plays a vital role in the effective enzymatic C1 reduction. Hydrogenase utilizes renewable hydrogen to achieve the regeneration and supply cofactor nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NADH), providing a driving force for the reduction reaction to reduce the thermodynamic barrier of the reaction cascade, and making the forward reduction pathway thermodynamically feasible. Based on the regeneration of cofactor NADH by hydrogenase, and coupled with formaldehyde dehydrogenase and formolase, a favorable thermodynamic mode of the C1 reduction pathway for reducing formate to dihydroxyacetone (DHA) was designed and constructed. This resulted in accumulation of 373.19 µmol·L<sup>−1</sup> DHA after 2 h, and conversion reaching 7.47%. These results indicate that enzymatic utilization of hydrogen as the electron donor to regenerate NADH is of great significance to the sustainable and green development of bio-manufacturing because of its high economic efficiency, no by-products, and environment-friendly operation. Moreover, formolase efficiently and selectively fixed the intermediate formaldehyde (FALD) to DHA, thermodynamically pulled formate to efficiently reduce to DHA, and finally stored the low-grade renewable energy into chemical energy with high energy density.\u0000</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 7","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-05-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141171359","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}
Mohamed Gamal Gomaa, Hamdy Maamoun Abdel-Ghafar, Francesco Galiano, Francesca Russo, Alberto Figoli, El-Sayed Ali Abdel-Aal, Abdel-Hakim Taha Kandil, Bahaa Ahmed Salah
{"title":"Ultralong hydroxyapatite-based forward osmosis membrane for freshwater generation","authors":"Mohamed Gamal Gomaa, Hamdy Maamoun Abdel-Ghafar, Francesco Galiano, Francesca Russo, Alberto Figoli, El-Sayed Ali Abdel-Aal, Abdel-Hakim Taha Kandil, Bahaa Ahmed Salah","doi":"10.1007/s11705-024-2450-0","DOIUrl":"10.1007/s11705-024-2450-0","url":null,"abstract":"<div><p>Increasing global water shortages are accelerating the pace of membrane manufacturing, which generates many environmentally harmful solvents. Such challenges need a radical rethink of developing innovative membranes that can address freshwater production without generating environmentally harmful solvents. This work utilized the synthesized ultra-long hydroxyapatite (UHA) by the solvothermal method using the green solvent oleic acid in preparing UHA-based forward osmosis membranes. The membranes were developed using different loading ratios of graphene oxide (GO) by vacuum-assisted filtration technique. The prepared GO/UHA membranes were identified using X-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscope, Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy, and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. Water contact angle and pore size distribution were determined for the obtained GO/UHA membranes. The obtained hierarchical porous structure in the prepared membranes with interconnected channels results in a stable water flux with reverse salt flux. The best water flux rate of 42 ± 2 L·m<sup>−2</sup>·h<sup>−1</sup> was achieved using the 50 mg GO/UHA membrane, which is 3.3 times higher than the pristine membrane, and a reverse salt flux of 67 g·m<sup>−2</sup>·h<sup>−1</sup>. The obtained results showed a promising capability of a new generation of sustainable inorganic-based membranes that can be utilized in freshwater generation by energy-efficient techniques such as forward osmosis.\u0000</p><div><figure><div><div><picture><source><img></source></picture></div></div></figure></div></div>","PeriodicalId":571,"journal":{"name":"Frontiers of Chemical Science and Engineering","volume":"18 9","pages":""},"PeriodicalIF":4.3,"publicationDate":"2024-05-24","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"https://link.springer.com/content/pdf/10.1007/s11705-024-2450-0.pdf","citationCount":null,"resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":"141171358","PeriodicalName":null,"FirstCategoryId":null,"ListUrlMain":null,"RegionNum":3,"RegionCategory":"工程技术","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":"OA","EPubDate":null,"PubModel":null,"JCR":null,"JCRName":null,"Score":null,"Total":0}