Two-dimensional titanium carbide MXene produced by ternary cations intercalation via structural control with angstrom-level precision

Zehai Xu; Yufan Zhang; Minmin Liu; Qin Meng; Chong Shen; Lushen Xu; Guoliang Zhang; Congjie Gao

doi:10.1016/j.isci.2022.105562

Two-dimensional titanium carbide MXene produced by ternary cations intercalation via structural control with angstrom-level precision

iScience. 2022 Nov 15;25(12):105562. doi: 10.1016/j.isci.2022.105562. eCollection 2022 Dec 22.

Authors

Zehai Xu¹, Yufan Zhang², Minmin Liu¹, Qin Meng³, Chong Shen^{1

3}, Lushen Xu¹, Guoliang Zhang¹, Congjie Gao¹

Affiliations

¹ Center for Membrane and Water Science & Technology, Institute of Oceanic and Environmental Chemical Engineering, State Key Lab Breeding Base of Green Chemical Synthesis Technology, Zhejiang University of Technology, Hangzhou 310014, P. R. China.
² College of Engineering, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA 15213, USA.
³ College of Chemical and Biological Engineering, State Key Laboratory of Chemical Engineering, Zhejiang University, Hangzhou 310027, P. R. China.

Abstract

Highly effective decontamination of lead is a primary challenge for ecosystem protection and public health. Herein, we report a methodology of ternary cations intercalation to synthesize Ti₃C₂T_x MXene by structural control with angstrom-level precision through mixed fluorinated salts wet etching-alkalization approach for high-efficient lead adsorption. The successive introduction of lithium, potassium, and sodium ions continuously weakens interaction forces between Ti₃C₂T_x layers, resulting in achieving fine tailored interlayer distance from 9.8 to 15.9 Å. A high density of complexing groups are formed after ternary cations intercalation, which greatly improve the hydrophilicity of Ti₃C₂T_x to enhance the accessibility and shorten the mass transfer and provide abundant adsorption sites to exhibit strong complexing effects with lead ions. The prepared ternary cations-intercalated Ti₃C₂T_x nanosheets exhibited a high adsorption capacity (267.2 mg/g) toward lead ions and sharply cut down lead concentration from 10 to 0.009 mg/L, far below the drinking water standards (0.015 mg/L).

Keywords: Materials structure; Nanomaterials.