hydrogen, [2] solar power plants, [3] photovoltaic cells, [4] photocatalysis, [5] and water desalination, [6] the photothermal materials based solar water evaporation is one of the most promising approaches for harvesting and conversion of solar energy. Solar vapor generation, more specifically, is a surface water evaporation process in which the light is absorbed and converted to heat energy by photothermal materials to generate vapor. Compared with the common water evaporation by solar radiation as heat source which suffers from the drawback of low solar energy conversion efficiency due to the fact that the part solar energy is converted to heat bulk water or is lost to the external environment, solar vapor generation based on photothermal materials has great advantages for its high light-to-heat conversion efficiency due to the fact that solar radiation is only harvested and located at the water-air interface to heat thin air-water surface layer that can effectively minimize the heat loss. [7] Based on the merits mentioned above, up to now, the solar steam generator has been emerged as a kind of efficient device for harvesting solar energy and attracted extensively much more attention in both industrial and academic research throughout the past decades. [8,9] In a given solar steam generation system, the photothermal materials is essential. A desired photothermal material should meet the following criteria: the broadband sunlight absorbability, low thermal conductivity, open porosity for rapid water molecules transportation, and high-energy conversion efficiency. [10,11] Understanding of these complementary roles of these parameters for photothermal material, so far, a number of photothermal materials, including carbon-based materials, [7,8,[12][13][14] metallic nanoparticles, [15][16][17] biomass-based materials, [18,19] and porous polymers, [20,21] etc., have been developed to use as efficient solar steam generators.In general, porous materials with bilayer structure are widely adapted as solar steam generator, in which the top layer consists of carbon materials for light absorption (e.g., graphene, [13] CNTs, [14] graphite, [7] etc.) while the bottom layer is composed by the porous materials (e.g., wood, [18] silica, [10] etc.) for Solar steam generation has been proven to be one of the most efficient approaches for harvesting solar energy for diverse applications such as distillation, desalination, and production of freshwater. Here, the synthesis of monolithic carbon aerogels by facile carbonization of conjugated microporous polymer nanotubes as efficient solar steam generators is reported. The monolithic carbon-aerogel networks consist of randomly aggregated hollow-carbon-nanotubes (HCNTs) with 100-250 nm in diameter and a length of up to several micrometers to form a hierarchically nanoporous network structure. Treatment of the HCNTs aerogels with an ammonium peroxydisulfate/sulfuric acid solution endows their superhydrophilic wettability which is beneficial for rapid transportation of water molecules. ...

Sodium-ion battery technologies are known to suffer from kinetic problems associated with the solid-state diffusion of Na in intercalation electrodes, which results in suppressed specific capacity and degraded rate performance. Here, a controllable selective etching approach is developed for the synthesis of Prussian blue analogue (PBA) with enhanced sodium storage activity. On the basis of time-dependent experiments, a defect-induced morphological evolution mechanism from nanocube to nanoflower structure is proposed. Through in situ X-ray diffraction measurement and computational analysis, this unique structure is revealed to provide higher Na diffusion dynamics and negligible volume change during the sodiation/desodiation processes. As a sodium ion battery cathode, the PBA exhibits a discharge capacity of 90 mA h g, which is in good agreement with the complete low spin Fe(C) redox reaction. It also demonstrates an outstanding rate capability of 71.0 mA h g at 44.4 C, as well as an unprecedented cycling reversibility over 5000 times.

Conjugated microporous polymers having thiophene building blocks (SCMPs), which originated from ethynylbenzene monomers with 2,3,5-tribromothiophene, were designedly synthesized through Pd(0)/CuI catalyzed Sonogashira-Hagihara cross-coupling polymerization. The morphologies, structure and physicochemical properties of the as-synthesized products were characterized through scanning electron microscope (SEM), thermogravimeter analysis (TGA), (13)C CP/MAS solid state NMR and Fourier transform infrared spectroscope (FTIR) spectra. Nitrogen sorption-desorption analysis shows that the as-synthesized SCMPs possesses a high specific surface area of 855 m(2) g(-1). Because of their abundant porosity, π-conjugated network structure, as well as electron-rich thiophene building units, the SCMPs show better adsorption ability for iodine and a high uptake value of 222 wt % was obtained, which can compete with those nanoporous materials such as silver-containing zeolite, metal-organic frameworks (MOFs) and conjugated microporous polymers (CMPs), etc. Our study might provide a new possibility for the design and synthesis of functional CMPs containing electron-rich building units for effective capture and reversible storage of volatile iodine to address environmental issues.

Conjugated microporous polymer nanotubes (CMPNs) were synthesized and employed as a platform for investigation of CO2 and I2 adsorption. A high adsorption capacity of up to 208 wt% for reversible I2 capture was achieved.

Coordination compounds such as Prussian blue and its analogues are acknowledged as promising candidates for electrochemical sodium storage owing to their tailorable frameworks. However, a key challenge for these electrode materials is the trade-off between energy and power. Here, we demonstrate that Prussian white (Na 3.1 Fe 4 [Fe(CN) 6 ] 3 ) hierarchical nanotubes with fully open framework configurations render extrinsic Na + intercalation pseudocapacitance. The cathode exhibits a capacity up to 83 mAh g -1 at an ultra-high rate of 50 C and an unprecedented cycle life over 10000 times for sodium storage. In situ Raman spectroscopy together with In situ X-ray diffraction analysis reveal that intercalation pseudocapacitance enables full reaction of N-Fe III /Fe II sites in Prussian white with a negligible volume expansion (< 2.1%). The discovery of surface-controlled charge storage occurring inside the entire bulk of intercalation cathodes paves a new way for developing high power, high energy, and long life-span sodium-ion batteries.