title: Rapid Room-Temperature Gelation of Crude Oils by a Wetted Powder Gelator.
abstract: Phase-selective organogelators (PSOGs) not only exhibit ability to phase-selectively congeal oil from oily water but also allow easy separation of gelled oil from the body of water. However, all hitherto reported PSOGs either necessitate carrier solvents for their dissolution or suffer from an extremely slow action in gelling oil in the powder form. A previously unexplored generally applicable wetting strategy is now described to dramatically enhance, by up to two orders of magnitude, gelling speed of the resultant wet but non-sticky gelator in the powder form in crude oils of widely ranging viscosities. Such unprecedented rapid gelling speeds enable rapid gelation of six types of (un)weathered crude oils within minutes at room temperature, making PSOGs one step closer to their eventual practical uses as one of important oil spill control technologies.
authors.affiliation: Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, 31 Biopolis Way, The Nanos, Singapore, 138669, Singapore.
authors.forename: Changliang
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Ren
authors.affiliation: Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, 31 Biopolis Way, The Nanos, Singapore, 138669, Singapore.
authors.forename: Jie
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Shen
authors.affiliation: Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, 31 Biopolis Way, The Nanos, Singapore, 138669, Singapore.
authors.forename: Feng
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Chen
authors.affiliation: Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, 31 Biopolis Way, The Nanos, Singapore, 138669, Singapore.
authors.forename: Huaqiang
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Zeng
keywords: crude oil; environmental remediation; oil spill control technologies; powder gelators; supramolecular chemistry