2015, Hess, Samuel C., Kohll, A. Xavier, Raso, Renzo, Schumacher, Christoph M., Grass, Robert N., Stark, Wendelin J.

A novel solvent-evaporation-based process that exploits template-particle stabilized bicontinuous emulsions for the formation of previously unreached membrane morphologies is reported in this article. Porous membranes have a wide range of applications spanning from water filtration, pharmaceutical purification, and battery separators to scaffolds for tissue engineering. Different situations require different membrane morphologies including various pore sizes and pore gradients. However, most of the previously reported membrane preparation procedures are restricted to specific morphologies and morphology alterations require an extensive optimization process. The tertiary system presented in this article, which consists of a poly(ether sulfone)/dimethylacetamide (PES/DMAc) solution, glycerol, and ZnO-nanoparticles, allows simple and exact tuning of pore diameters ranging from sub-20 nm, up to 100 nm. At the same time, the pore size gradient is controlled from 0 up to 840%/μm yielding extreme asymmetry. In addition to structural analysis, water flux rates of over 5600 L m–2 h–1 are measured for membranes retaining 45 nm silica beads.

2014, Schneider, Elia M., Raso, Renzo, Hofer, Corinne J., Zeltner, Martin, Stettler, Robert D., Hess, Samuel C., Grass, Robert N., Stark, Wendelin J.

Workup in organic synthesis can be very time-consuming, particularly when using reagents with both a solubility similar to that of the desired products and a tendency not to crystallize. In this respect, reactions involving organic bases would strongly benefit from a tremendously simplified separation process. Therefore, we synthesized a derivative of the superbasic proton sponge 1,8-bis(dimethylamino)naphthalene (DMAN) and covalently linked it to the strongest currently available nanomagnets based on carbon-coated cobalt metal nanoparticles. The immobilized magnetic superbase reagent was tested in Knoevenagel- and Claisen-Schmidt-type condensations and showed conversions of up to 99%. High yields of up to 97% isolated product could be obtained by simple recrystallization without using column chromatography. Recycling the catalyst was simple and fast with an insignificant decrease in catalytic activity.