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Environ Health Perspect 2021 Apr 12;129(4):47009. Epub 2021 Apr 12.

Institute for Risk Assessment Sciences, Utrecht University, Utrecht, Netherlands.

Background: Inconsistent associations between long-term exposure to particles with an aerodynamic diameter [fine particulate matter ()] components and mortality have been reported, partly related to challenges in exposure assessment.

Objectives: We investigated the associations between long-term exposure to elemental components and mortality in a large pooled European cohort; to compare health effects of components estimated with two exposure modeling approaches, namely, supervised linear regression (SLR) and random forest (RF) algorithms.

Methods: We pooled data from eight European cohorts with 323,782 participants, average age 49 y at baseline (1985-2005). Read More

ACS Appl Mater Interfaces 2021 Apr 6. Epub 2021 Apr 6.

Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, Illinois 60115, United States.

The practical deployment of advanced Li-S batteries is severely constrained by the uncontrollable lithium polysulfide conversion under realistic conditions. Although a plethora of advanced sulfur hosts and electrocatalysts have been examined, the fundamental mechanisms are still elusive and predictive design approaches have not yet been established. Here, we examined a series of well-defined Fe-N-C sulfur hosts with systematically varied and strongly coupled FeC and Fe electrocatalysts, prepared by one-step pyrolysis of a novel Fe[Fe(CN)]/polypyrrole composite at different temperatures. Read More

J Colloid Interface Sci 2021 Mar 24;595:51-58. Epub 2021 Mar 24.

School of Materials Science and Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Reliability and Intelligence of Electrical Equipment, Hebei University of Technology, Tianjin 300130, China. Electronic address:

Lithium-sulfur (Li-S) batteries have drawn a lot of attention owing to the high theoretical capacity of 1675 mAh g, environmental friendliness and relative abundance of sulfur. Nevertheless, the severe dissolution and migration of lithium polysulfides (LiPSs) and poor conductivity of sulfur greatly hinder the practical application of Li-S batteries. In this work, Fe-Ni-P@nitrogen-doped carbon (named as Fe-Ni-P@NC) derived from Fe-Ni Prussian blue analog (Fe-Ni PBA) was used as highly efficient sulfur host for Li-S batteries. Read More

Polymers (Basel) 2021 Mar 26;13(7). Epub 2021 Mar 26.

Institute of General and Ecological Chemistry, Lodz University of Technology, 90-924 Lodz, Poland.

This paper examines the influence of the morphology of zinc oxide nanoparticles (n-ZnO) on the activation energy, vulcanization parameters, crosslink density, crosslink structure, and mechanical properties in the extension of the sulfur vulcanizates of styrene-butadiene rubber (SBR). Scanning electron microscopy was used to determine the particle size distribution and morphology, whereas the specific surface area (SSA) and squalene wettability of the n-ZnO nanoparticles were adequately evaluated using the Brunauer-Emmet-Teller (BET) equation and tensiometry. The n-ZnO were then added to the SBR in conventional (CV) or efficient (EV) vulcanization systems. Read More

Polymers (Basel) 2021 Mar 7;13(5). Epub 2021 Mar 7.

Instituto de Ciencia y Tecnología de Polímeros (CSIC), C/Juan de la Cierva 3, 28006 Madrid, Spain.

The outstanding properties of carbon nanotubes (CNTs) present some limitations when introduced into rubber matrices, especially when these nano-particles are applied in high-performance tire tread compounds. Their tendency to agglomerate into bundles due to van der Waals interactions, the strong influence of CNT on the vulcanization process, and the adsorptive nature of filler-rubber interactions contribute to increase the energy dissipation phenomena on rubber-CNT compounds. Consequently, their expected performance in terms of rolling resistance is limited. Read More