Topic Review
Mineral-Supported Photocatalysts
Although they are of significant importance for environmental applications, the industrialization of photocatalytic techniques still faces many difficulties, and the most urgent concern is cost control. Natural minerals possess abundant chemical inertia and cost-efficiency, which is suitable for hybridizing with various effective photocatalysts. The use of natural minerals in photocatalytic systems can not only significantly decrease the pure photocatalyst dosage but can also produce a favorable synergistic effect between photocatalyst and mineral substrate. Owing to their unique structures, large surface area, and negatively charged surface, silicate minerals could enhance the adsorption capacity, reduce particle aggregation, and promote photogenerated electron-hole pair separation for hybrid photocatalysts. Moreover, controlling the morphology and structure properties of these materials could have a great influence on their light-harvesting ability and photocatalytic activity. Composed of silica and alumina or magnesia, some silicate minerals possess unique orderly organized porous or layered structures, which are proper templates to modify the photocatalyst framework. The non-silicate minerals (referred to carbonate and carbon-based minerals, sulfate, and sulfide minerals and other special minerals) can function not only as catalyst supports but also as photocatalysts after special modification due to their unique chemical formula and impurities. The dye-sensitized minerals, as another natural mineral application in photocatalysis, are proved to be superior photocatalysts for hydrogen evolution and wastewater treatment. 
  • 351
  • 16 Aug 2022
Topic Review
Mineral Characterization Using Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM)
Scanning electron microscopy (SEM) is a powerful tool in the domains of materials science, mining, and geology owing to its enormous potential to provide unique insight into micro and nanoscale worlds. The rapid pace of technological development requires a detailed study of minerals to a further extent to meet the unprecedented material demands of the evolving world. There are more than 5956 species of minerals known today, and the number of new identifications is evolving, with as many as 50 new types identified each year. Quantitative measurements and qualitative analyses of mineral compositions within mining ores and reservoirs have valuable importance with practical applications. Comprehensive and accurate information can be gathered for the identification of rocks and minerals, including structural characteristics and mineral composition, which can provide worthy information about pore structure and reservoir heterogeneity.
  • 613
  • 29 Dec 2023
Topic Review
Milled Dental Surface Integrity
Surface integrity is a multiphysics (biological, mechanical, optical, chemical, esthetic, etc.) and multiscale (from nm to mm) concept. It is defined as the residual signature left on the surface by the manufacturing or post-treatment process and permits correlating the process with the expected surface functionalities. Thanks to the advances made in mechanical engineering, the concept of surface integrity has been transposed to dentistry and oral science. The surface integrity concept transposed to fixed dental prostheses is presented in this article. The main components of surface integrity and their correlations within the triptych of surface integrity–process–clinical functionalities are presented.
  • 672
  • 31 May 2021
Topic Review
Milk Whey Hydrolysates as High Value-Added Natural Polymers
There are two types of milk whey obtained from cheese manufacture: sweet and acid. It retains around 55% of the nutrients of the milk. Milk whey is considered as a waste, creating a critical pollution problem, because 9 L of whey are produced from every 10 L of milk. Some treatments such as hydrolysis by chemical, fermentation process, enzymatic action, and green technologies (ultrasound and thermal treatment) are successful in obtaining peptides from protein whey. Milk whey peptides possess excellent functional properties such as antihypertensive, antiviral, anticancer, immunity, and antioxidant, with benefits in the cardiovascular, digestive, endocrine, immune, and nervous system.
  • 611
  • 27 Apr 2022
Topic Review
Milk Fat Globule Membrane (MFGM)
Milk fat globule membrane (MFGM) is an important component of milk lipids that showed several biological properties (such as anticarcinogenic, antimicrobial, anti-inflammatory, and anticholesterolemic activities). In this review we analyse the latest results obtained from comparative proteomic studies regarding the variations and the similarities of MFGM proteome across species and lactation stages. Infant formula supplementation with MFGM represents an interesting opportunity to implement the bioactive properties exerted by MFGM, in order to narrow the gap between human breast milk and infant formula. 
  • 2.6K
  • 27 Sep 2020
Topic Review
Migration and Safety of Plastic Food Packaging Materials
The conventional packaging materials used for the preservation of foods may exhibit many disadvantages that are related to the migration of micromolecular chemical substances incorporated in the packaging material net to the packaged food. There are many chemical substances in the matrix of plastic packaging materials and epoxy-resins that are used in food packaging materials, varnishes, and can coatings. Many migrants have high toxicity, such as acetaldehyde, antimony, antimony (III) oxide, 2,4-di-tert-butylphenol, tris (2,4-di-tert-butylphenol) phosphate, tris(2,4-di-tert-butylphenyl) phosphite, bisphenol A, and the plasticizers di(2-ethylhexyl) phthalate), di-n-butyl phthalate, benzyl-butylphthalate, di-isononylphthalate, and di-isododecylphthalate.
  • 234
  • 06 Feb 2024
Topic Review
MIECs for Food Safety and Drug Detection
Due to their advantages of good flexibility, low cost, simple operations, and small equipment size, electrochemical sensors have been commonly employed in food safety. However, when they are applied to detect various food or drug samples, their stability and specificity can be greatly influenced by the complex matrix. By combining electrochemical sensors with molecular imprinting techniques (MIT), they will be endowed with new functions of specific recognition and separation, which make them powerful tools in analytical fields. MIT-based electrochemical sensors (MIECs) require preparing or modifying molecularly imprinted polymers (MIPs) on the electrode surface. MIECs behave promisingly in applications in food and drug safety detection.
  • 642
  • 06 Jun 2022
Topic Review
Microwave-Assisted Preparation of Luminescent Materials
Luminescent inorganic materials are used in several technological applications such as light-emitting displays, white LEDs for illumination, bioimaging, and photodynamic therapy. Usually, inorganic phosphors (e.g., complex oxides, silicates) need high temperatures and, in some cases, specific atmospheres to be formed or to obtain a homogeneous composition. Low ionic diffusion and high melting points of the precursors lead to long processing times in these solid-state syntheses with a cost in energy consumption when conventional heating methods are applied. Microwave-assisted synthesis relies on selective, volumetric heating attributed to the electromagnetic radiation interaction with the matter. The microwave heating allows for rapid heating rates and small temperature gradients yielding homogeneous, well-formed materials swiftly. Luminescent inorganic materials can benefit significantly from microwave-assisted synthesis for high homogeneity, diverse morphology, and rapid screening of different compositions. The rapid screening allows for fast material investigation, whereas the benefits of enhanced homogeneity include improvement in the optical properties such as quantum yields and storage capacity.
  • 1.0K
  • 23 Jun 2021
Topic Review
Microwave-Assisted Preparation for Graphene Functional Material
Graphite has excellent microwave absorption capability and electrical conductivity, microwave radiation on spent graphite can induce a Joule heat–discharge–plasma coupled effect, leading to a rapid heating process, especially when discharge occurs, exhibiting a thermal shock effect with the generation of a large number of high-energy electrons and active materials. This special feature facilitates microwave heating that is tailored for assisting the removal of impurities, structure repair, and graphite intercalation, exfoliation in an efficient manner and microwave-assisted preparation.
  • 400
  • 26 May 2023
Topic Review
Microwave-Assisted Post-Ugi Reactions for the Synthesis of Polycycles
Microwave-assisted post-Ugi reactions have been employed for the synthesis of diverse polycycles. From commercially available starting materials, transition metal-catalyzed or transition metal-free transformations are performed in an efficient, rapid, and step-economical manner. With the help of microwave irradiation, linear Ugi-adducts are converted into more complex drug-like polycycles with high chemo-, regio-, and stereoselectivity, exhibiting the robustness and potential of this strategy and unfolding a large window for organic synthesis.
  • 445
  • 30 May 2022
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