By integrating bio-inspired design with stimuli-responsive nanomaterials, Qiu’s group has established a new paradigm for solving critical challenges in drinking water scarcity, environmental sustainability, and human health. Our research excels in multi-scale engineering: we engineer molecular sieving channels via fullerene-tailored graphene oxide for low-energy desalination, design pH-responsive microbots for optimized photothermal degradation, and develop macro-scale, fish-gill-inspired aerogels to capture micro/nanoplastics with high efficiency. Collectively, those research bridge the gap between fundamental materials science and applied environmental engineering, offering a versatile toolkit of “smart” materials capable of autonomous sensing and highly selective separation.
Schematic illustrations of (a) multiscale architecture of fish gills, (b) fabrication procedures for Bidirectional Chitosan/cellulose nanofibrills/polydopamine aerogel, and (c) microplastic removal by adsorptive filtration system through multiple intermolecular interactions.*
*Yunchong Yang, Weijia Yan, Jun Ma, David Carmona, Chunka Zhou, Elise Nguyen, Jingjing Qiu. “Fish Gill-Inspired Bidirectional Porous Polysaccharide Aerogels for Micro/Nanoplastics Removal“. ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces. 17(46): 63488-63499, DOI: 10.1021/acsami.5c18203 (2025).