New materials help prevent pollution

Chemical experts from the University of California, Santa Cruz have developed a new material called SLUG-26, which is used to treat contaminated water through ion exchange.

The chemical name of SLUG-26 is copper hydroxide ethanedisulfonate . It has a layered structure of positively charged flat plates with the ability to retain negative ions. This study was published by Professor Oliver and his colleagues from the University of California in the American Journal of Angewandte Chemistry .

Honghan Fei scientist (Source: News.ucsc.edu)

Scott Oliver, professor of chemistry at the University of California, said: 'We have created new materials that can prevent contaminants or toxic substances. Test results have shown that this exchange process is completely effective '.

Currently, scientists are focusing on research, using SLUG-26 to capture artificial radioactive technetium (Technetium) . "This is a difficult problem solved by the rapid transformation of the environment, so scientific experts need to research and find new ways to stop it ," Professor Oliver explained.

Scott Oliver has been working to create a promising new material in the future. (Source: News.ucsc.edu)

In previous studies, scientists have used manganese to replace technetium radioactive element. In the next step, the scientists will focus on research on artificial radioactive elements technetium to see if SLUG-26 effectively performs its tasks as it did in previous studies.

According to Professor Oliver, whether this new material can be used in real life is still to be considered, depending on its properties. However, it does have positive results and signals anyway.