A Flexible Wearable Supernumerary Robotic Limb for Chronic Stroke Patients.

In this study, we present a flexible wearable supernumerary robotic limb that helps chronic stroke patients with finger rehabilitation and grasping movements. The design of this innovative limb draws inspiration from bending pneumatic muscles and the unique characteristics of an elephant's trunk tip. It places a strong emphasis on crucial factors such as lightweight construction, safety, compliance, waterproofing, and achieving a high output-to-weight/pressure ratio. The proposed structure enables the robotic limb to perform both envelope and fingertip grasping. Human-robot interaction is facilitated through a flexible bending sensor, detecting the wearer's finger movements and connecting them to motion control via a threshold segmentation method. Additionally, the system is portable for versatile daily use. To validate the effectiveness of this innovation, real-world experiments involving six chronic stroke patients and three healthy volunteers were conducted. The feedback received through questionnaires indicates that the designed mechanism holds immense promise in assisting chronic stroke patients with their daily grasping activities, potentially improving their quality of life and rehabilitation outcomes.

Biomass waste as a clean reductant for iron recovery of iron tailings by magnetization roasting.

The magnetization roasting with coal as primary reductants adds cost and causes environmental pollution. Therefore, it is of great importance to investigate the biomass application as a reductant for magnetization roasting to recover iron from low-utilization iron tailings for emission mitigation and green utilization. This study systematically investigated the impact of biomass (pyrolysis gas from agricultural and forestry waste) as a reductant on the conversion of iron tailings to magnetite in magnetization roasting. Additionally, the thermal decomposition of biomass, phase transformation and microstructure evolution of iron tailings were analyzed by TG, XRD, BET, and other methods to elucidate the conversion mechanism for facilitating magnetized hematite in iron tailings with biomass-derived gas. The results showed that woody biomass was a more appropriate reductant for magnetization roasting; 650 °C was the optimal temperature for the complete transformation of hematite to magnetite by reduction roasting with biomass waste. Through magnetic separation, the concentrate with an iron grade of 62.04% and iron recovery of 95.29% was obtained, and the saturation magnetization was enhanced from 0.60 emu/g to 58.03 emu/g of iron tailings. During the magnetization roasting, CO and H2 generated from biomass reduced the hematite in tailings particles from interior to exterior, forming a loose structure with rich microfissures, facilitating the subsequent separation operations. This study offers a novel reference for applying biomass to exploit hematite minerals and shows the potential of biomass for energy savings and emission reduction in the utilization of iron tailing resources.

Nitrogen-enriched micro-mesoporous carbon derived from polymers organic frameworks for high-performance capacitive deionization.

Nitrogenization is an effective method for improving the capacitive deionization (CDI) performance of porous carbon materials. In particular, polymer organic frameworks with heteroatom doping, containing an ordered pore structure and excellent electrochemical stability, are ideal precursors for carbon materials for high-performance CDI. In this study, a nitrogen-enriched micro-mesoporous carbon (NMC) electrode was fabricated by carbonizing a Schiff base network-1 at 500, 600, and 700 °C. Scanning electron microscopy, Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy, X-ray diffraction, N2 adsorption-desorption, the contact angle of water, cyclic voltammetry, and electrochemical impedance spectroscopy were used to characterize the morphological structure, wettability, Brunauer-Emmett-Teller surface areas, and electrochemical performance of the NMCs. The results showed that the NMC carbonized at 600°C achieved the best specific capacitance (152.33 F/g), as well as a high electrosorption capacity (25.53 mg/g) because of its chemical composition (15.57% N) and surface area (312 m2/g). These findings prove that NMC is viable as an electrode material for desalination by high-performance CDI applications.