Fig. 1: Description of the confined self-assembly and crosslinking process at a sharp free interface and the resulting sub-8 nm networked cage nanofilms.
From: Sub-8 nm networked cage nanofilm with tunable nanofluidic channels for adaptive sieving
a Crosslinking POCs at a free interface between water and the organic phase by trimesoyl chloride and the schematic diagram of networked cage nanofilm with water channel for rapid molecular separation. b Free-standing cage nanofilm formed at the aqueous-organic free interface in a 20 ml vial. c Photograph of nanofilm transferred onto polymer substrate. The orange frame indicates the nanofilm boundary. d Top-down SEM image of the composite membrane with a substrate of porous polyethylene (PE) ultrafiltration membrane. Inset is a high-magnification SEM image of PE support. e High-magnification SEM image of cage nanofilm supported by PE membrane. f, g AFM height image and corresponding height profile of a section of cage nanofilm on top of a silicon wafer. h Thickness increases with the reaction time. Error bars represent the standard deviation calculated from three parallel measurements. i 3D view of the cage nanofilm with interconnected pore network. j Simulated pore size distribution. k UV/vis absorption of the cage and its fragment detected at a position 30 μm away from O/W interface versus interfacial diffusion time.
