Facile one pot synthesis of 2-substituted benzimidazole derivatives under mild conditions by using engineered MgO@DFNS as heterogeneous catalyst.

Benzimidazole derivatives are considered as important heterocyclic motifs that show a wide range of pharmaceutical applications. In view of their wide-ranging bioactivities, it is imperative to direct research on the sustainable catalytic synthesis of benzimidazole. Therefore, herein, we report a novel approach for the synthesis of benzimidazole and its derivatives with engineered MgO supported on dendritic fibrous nano silica (MgO@DFNS) as a sustainable heterogeneous catalyst. The catalyst MgO@DFNS was thoroughly characterized to understand its physio-chemical properties using XRD, FE-SEM, XPS, FT-IR, zeta potential, HR-TEM, TGA, TPR and TPD. The obtained results suggested that the catalyst MgO@DFNS prepared well and have the desired characteristics in it. After the successful characterisation of the prepared catalyst MgO@DFNS, it was applied in the synthesis of benzimidazole derivatives via condensation of o-phenylenediamine, and various aromatic and aliphatic aldehydes under ambient temperature. The catalyst produced a clean reaction profile with excellent yields in a shorter time under the umbrella of green chemistry. The effect of reaction parameters such as the effect of time, catalyst dosage, loading of MgO, effect of solvents and effect of different homo and heterogeneous catalyst were also tested. Furthermore, to understand the scope of the catalyst different substituted diamines and substituted aldehydes were reacted and obtained desired products in good to efficient yield. In addition, a recyclability study was also conducted and it was observed that the catalyst could be recycled for up to six cycles without noticeable changes in the morphology and activity. We believe that the present methodology gave several advantages such as an eco-friendly method, easy work-up, good selectivity, high yields and quick recovery of catalyst. MgO@DFNS is highly stable for several cycles without significant loss of its activity, which possibly demonstrates its applicability at the industrial scale.

Laser-Assisted Scalable Pore Fabrication in Graphene Membranes for Blue-Energy Generation.

The osmotic energy from a salinity gradient (i. e. blue energy) is identified as a promising non-intermittent renewable energy source for a sustainable technology. However, this membrane-based technology is facing major limitations for large-scale viability, primarily due to the poor membrane performance. An atomically thin 2D nanoporous material with high surface charge density resolves the bottleneck and leads to a new class of membrane material the salinity gradient energy. Although 2D nanoporous membranes show extremely high performance in terms of energy generation through the single pore, the fabrication and technical challenges such as ion concentration polarization make the nanoporous membrane a non-viable solution. On the other hand, the mesoporous and micro porous structures in the 2D membrane result in improved energy generation with very low fabrication complexity. In the present work, we report femtosecond (fs) laser-assisted scalable fabrication of µm to mm size pores on Graphene membrane for blue energy generation for the first time. A remarkable osmotic power in the order of µW has been achieved using mm size pores, which is about six orders of magnitudes higher compared to nanoporous membranes, which is mainly due to the diffusion-osmosis driven large ionic flux. Our work paves the way towards fs laser-assisted scalable pore creation in the 2D membrane for large-scale osmotic power generation.

Electrodiffusioosmosis induced negative differential resistance in micro-to-millimeter size pores through a graphene/copper membrane.

Negative differential resistance (NDR) is one of the nonlinear transport phenomena in which ionic current decreases with the increase in electromotive potential. Electro-osmosis, diffusio-osmosis, and surface charge density of pores are the driving forces for observing NDR in nanoscale ion transport. Here, we report electrodiffusioosmosis induced NDR using micro to millimeter size pores in a two-dimensional (2D) graphene-coated copper (Gr/Cu) membrane. Along with NDR, we also observed ion current rectification (ICR), in which there is preferential one-directional ion flow for equal and opposite potentials. The experimentally observed NDR effect has been validated by performing ion transport simulations using Poisson-Nernst-Planck (PNP) equations and Navier-Stokes equations with the help of COMSOL Multiphysics considering salinity gradient across the membrane. Charge polarization induced electro-osmotic flow (EOF) dominates over diffusio-osmosis, causing the backflow of low concentration/conductivity solution into the pore, thereby causing NDR. This finding paves the way toward potential applications in ionic tunnel diodes as rectifiers, switches, amplifiers, and biosensors.