title: Nanobubbles at Hydrophilic Particle-Water Interfaces.
abstract: The puzzling persistence of nanobubbles breaks Laplace's law for bubbles, which is of great interest for promising applications in surface processing, H2and CO2storage, water treatment, and drug delivery. So far, nanobubbles have mostly been reported on hydrophobic planar substrates with atomic flatness. It remains a challenge to quantify nanobubbles on rough and irregular surfaces because of the lack of a characterization technique that can detect both the nanobubble morphology and chemical composition inside individual nanobubble-like objects. Here, by using synchrotron-based scanning transmission soft X-ray microscopy (STXM) with nanometer resolution, we discern nanoscopic gas bubbles of >25 nm with direct in situ proof of O2inside the nanobubbles at a hydrophilic particle-water interface under ambient conditions. We find a stable cloud of O2nanobubbles at the diatomite particle-water interface hours after oxygen aeration and temperature variation. The in situ technique may be useful for many surface nanobubble-related studies such as material preparation and property manipulation, phase equilibrium, nucleation kinetics, and relationships with chemical composition within the confined nanoscale space. The oxygen nanobubble clouds may be important in modifying particle-water interfaces and offering breakthrough technologies for oxygen delivery in sediment and/or deep water environments.
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100085, China.|School of Animal, Rural and Environmental Sciences, Nottingham Trent University , Brackenhurst Campus, Southwell NG25 0QF, United Kingdom.
authors.forename: Gang
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Pan
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Guangzhi
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: He
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Meiyi
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Qin
authors.initials: Q
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.affiliation: Advanced Light Source, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory , Berkeley, California 94720, United States.
authors.forename: Tolek
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Tyliszczak
authors.affiliation: Shanghai Synchrotron Radiation Facility, Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Shanghai 201204, China.
authors.forename: Renzhong
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Tai
authors.affiliation: Advanced Light Source, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory , Berkeley, California 94720, United States.
authors.forename: Jinghua
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Lei
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Bi
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Lei
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Wang
authors.affiliation: Research Center for Eco-Environmental Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences , Beijing 100085, China.
authors.forename: Honggang
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zhang