The effective resource utilization of agricultural and forestry waste has always been a core issue in the field of environmental protection. In this study, nitric acid-potassium hydroxide (HNO3-KOH) was used to modify the peanut shell, and the effects of different adsorption time, initial concentration and exogenous Cr(III) addition on the adsorption of Cu(II) were investigated. The results show that the adsorption of Cu(II) on peanut shell raw material (HS-YL) and acid-base modified peanut shell (HS-SJ) was in accordance with the pseudo-second-order kinetic model. Isotherm study shows that HS-YL fitted Langmuir adsorption model, mainly exhibiting monomolecular and chemical adsorption. HS-SJ conformed to the Freundlich adsorption model, which was mainly controlled by multi-layer adsorption. Additionally, when Cr(III) and Cu(II) coexisted, HS-SJ could simultaneously adsorb two heavy metals in a large amount, showing stronger adsorption performance compared to HS-YL. Therefore, the acid-base combined modification method is one of the important ways to recycle peanut shells.

The over production of reactive oxygen species (ROS) plays a critical role in the progression of chronic kidney disease (CKD). Organic ROS scavengers currently used for CKD treatment do not satisfy low dosage and high efficiency requirements. Ceria nanomaterials featured with renewable ROS scavenging activity are potential candidates for CKD treatment. Herein, a method for the synthesis of ceria nanoclusters (NCs) featured with small size of ≈1.2 nm is reported. The synthesized NCs are modified by three hydrophilic ligands with different molecular weights, including succinic acid (SA), polyethylene glycol diacid 600 (PEG600), and polyethylene glycol diacid 2000 (PEG2000). The surface modified NCs exhibit excellent ROS scavenging activity due to the high Ce3+/Ce4+ ratio in their crystal structures. Compared with bigger‐sized ceria nanoparticles (NPs) (≈45 nm), NCs demonstrate smoother blood concentration‐time curve, lower organ accumulation, and faster metabolic rate superiorities. The administration of NCs to CKD mice, especially PEG600 and PEG2000 modified NCs, can effectively inhibit oxidative stress, inflammation, renal fibrosis, and apoptosis in their kidneys. Due to these benefits, the constructed NCs can ameliorate the progression of CKD. These findings suggest that NCs is a potential redox nanomedicine for future clinical treatment of CKD.

The overproduction of reactive oxygen species (ROS) is one of the major reasons for the aggravation of acute lung injury (ALI). Smaller‐sized ceria nanoparticles featured with higher ROS scavenging capability than their bigger‐sized counterparts are potential candidates for ALI therapy. However, smaller‐sized ceria nanoparticles are more easily accumulated in spleen and liver rather than lung. Herein, it is reported that this obstacle can be addressed by constructing ceria into ultrafine nanowires, through which the ultrafine diameter ensures the high ROS scavenging activity and the high aspect ratio promotes the lung targeted accumulation. To demonstrate the feasibility of this conception, a platform is developed to realize length‐controlled ceria nanowires (diameter of ≈1.5 nm) synthesis. These nanowires are PEGylated using a carefully optimized procedure that can preserve their fragile crystal structures. The PEGylated nanowires exhibit higher ROS scavenging capabilities than the ≈3.9 nm sized nanoparticles. Most importantly, lung targeted accumulation can be realized through modulating the length of the nanowires, where the longer nanowires (>100 nm) show much higher lung accumulation. Due to these properties, the longer ceria nanowires can effectively scavenge the overproduced ROS during the progression of ALI, and thereby inhibit the edema and inflammation in the lung tissue.

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