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Boron nitride nanotube (BNNT) is a novel material that shows potential ability in capturing organic pollutants. In this study, BNNTs fixed on a stainless steel fiber by a sol-gel technique were used as sorbent for solid-phase microextraction. Five polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons with different numbers of aromatic rings were selected as target analysts. Gas chromatography coupled with tandem mass spectrometry was used for detection and quantitative determination. Under optimized conditions, the experimental results show a wide range of linearity (1 to 1,000 ng L(-1)), less than 10.1 % repeatability of relative standard deviation, and low detection limits (0.08 to 0.39 ng L(-1)). In addition, the fabricated fiber offered good thermal and chemical stability. The proposed method was successfully applied for the analysis of real water samples, and satisfactory results were obtained with relative recoveries ranging from 80.2 to 116.8 %. The results demonstrated that BNNTs could be used as sorbent for the analysis of environmental pollutants at trace levels.

We report the experimental and theoretical study of boron nitride nanotube (BNNT) torsional mechanics. We show that BNNTs exhibit a much stronger mechanical interlayer coupling than carbon nanotubes (CNTs). This feature makes BNNTs up to 1 order of magnitude stiffer and stronger than CNTs. We attribute this interlayer locking to the faceted nature of BNNTs, arising from the polarity of the B-N bond. This property makes BNNTs superior candidates to replace CNTs in nanoelectromechanical systems (NEMS), fibers, and nanocomposites.

Multiwalled boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs) functionalized with Fe(3)O(4) nanoparticles (NPs) were used for arsenic removal from water solutions. Sonication followed by a heating process was developed to in situ functionalize Fe(3)O(4) NPs onto a tube surface. A batch of adsorption experiments conducted at neutral pH (6.9) and room temperature (25 degrees C) and using the developed nanocomposites revealed effective arsenic (V) removal. The Langmuir, Freundlich, and Dubinin-Radushkevich adsorption isotherms were measured for a range of As(V) initial concentrations from 1 to 40 mg/L under the same conditions. The equilibrium data well fitted all isotherms, indicating that the mechanism for As(V) adsorption was a combination of chemical complexation and physical electrostatic attraction with a slight preference for chemisorption. The magnetite NPs functionalized on BNNTs led to a simple and rapid separation of magnetic metal-loaded adsorbents from the treated water under an external magnetic field.

We have used Raman spectroscopy to study the behavior of multi-walled boron nitride nanotubes and hexagonal boron nitride crystals under high pressure. While boron nitride nanotubes show an irreversible transformation at about 12 GPa, hexagonal boron nitride exhibits a reversible phase transition at 13 GPa. We also present molecular dynamics simulations which suggest that the irreversibility of the pressure-induced transformation in boron nitride nanotubes is due to the polar nature of the bonds between boron and nitrogen.

A comprehensive understanding of the design, synthesis, characterization, and properties of boron carbonitride nanotubes (BCN) is presented in this review. Distinctive structural and electronic properties are revealed in theoretical studies of the BCN nanotubes and compared with the properties of carbon nanotubes. In the experimental studies, BCN nanotubes have been synthesized by various techniques. For different purposes, controllable growth processes have been used to fabricate BCN nanotubes with novel structures, such as nanojunctions and filled nanotubes. Some interesting phenomena originating from the substitution of B and N atoms, such as the phase segregation, are considered theoretically and experimentally. Mainly the physical properties--field electron emission and photoluminescence--are discussed, which turn out to have potential applications in the industry.

Boron nitride nanotube (BNNT)@mesoporous silica hybrids with controllable surface zeta potential were fabricated for intracellular delivery of doxorubicin. The materials showed higher suspension ability, doxorubicin intracellular endocytosis efficiency, and LNcap prostate cancer cell killing ability compared with naked BNNTs.

The oxidation process of boron nitride nanotubes was thoroughly investigated, and a slow oxidation characteristic was clearly revealed. Subsequently, the controllable oxidation process was utilized to break the sturdy structure of the boron nitride nanotubes to fabricate shortened nanotubes. The shortened boron nitride nanotubes were found to possess good solubility in water and many organic solvents. Further experiments demonstrated remarkably improved molecule-loading capacity of the shortened boron nitride nanotubes. These dispersible shortened boron nitride nanotubes might have the potential to be developed as effective delivery systems for various molecules, which may find applications in bio-related fields.

A submicrometer-sized pH sensor based on biotin-fluorescein-functionalized multiwalled BN nanotubes with anchored Ag nanoparticles is designed. Intrinsic pH-dependent photoluminescence and Raman signals in attached fluorescein molecules enhanced by Ag nanoparticles allow this novel nanohybrid to perform as a practical pH sensor. It is able to work in a submicrometer-sized space. For example, the sensor may determine the environmental pH of sub-units in living cells where a traditional optical fiber sensor fails because of spatial limitations.

The dispersion of nanomaterials in solutions is of primary importance for the improvement of their processability, but it also provides a way to investigate phase behavior and to assemble nanostructures in solvents. Several methods based on different interactions have been developed to disperse carbon nanotubes, whereas little development has been made for their boron nitride nanotube (BNNT) counterparts. A direct way to obtain long-range ordering may be through spontaneous nematic ordering in solutions at sufficiently high concentrations of the nanomaterial fraction. Lyotropic nematics have been observed in various organic and inorganic systems. In this work, the strong interactions between DNA and BNNTs were exploited to fabricate high-concentration BNNTs aqueous solutions by a simple method, and then, for the first time, nematic ordered ensembles of BNNTs were obtained by filtration. It is proposed that a localized liquid-crystal phase appears during filtration, as the ordering trend for the BNNTs was found to depend on the concentration of the aqueous solutions of the BNNTs. Moreover, BNNTs were successfully localized on a predefined area by using a thiol-modified DNA-BNNT hybrid.

Adopting a wet chemistry method, Au and Fe3O4 nanoparticles were functionalized on boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs) successfully for the first time. X-ray diffraction pattern and transmission electron microscopy were used to characterize the resultant products. Subsequently, a method was proposed to fabricate heterojunction structures based on the particle-functionalized BNNTs. As a demonstration, BNNT-carbon nanostructure, BNNT-ZnO and BNNT-Ga2O3 junctions were successfully fabricated using the functionalized particles as catalysts.

Boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs) were synthesized by a carbon-free chemical vapor deposition method using boron and metal oxide as reactants. Then SnO(2) nanoparticles were functionalized on them via a simple wet chemistry method. Detailed transmission electron microscopy (TEM) observations reveal that SnO(2) nanoparticles may cover the tube surface or be encapsulated in tube channels. The lattice distances of both BNNT and SnO(2) have been changed due to the strong interactions between them. The band gap energy of SnO(2) particles is found enlarged due to the size effect and interaction with BNNTs.

The isolation of individual boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs) in aqueous phases has been achieved for the first time from raw materials based on the combination of peptide wrapping with a sonication procedure. Atomic force microscopic observations revealed the representative height and length of individual BNNTs. Fluorescence and infrared absorption spectra suggested the strong pi-pi interactions between BNNTs and the peptide. The absorption maxima of BNNTs were significantly blue-shifted from 200 nm for the original BNNTs to 193 nm. The modulation of the BNNT band gap with peptide wrapping promises potential applications of the peptide/BNNT complexes to various nanotechnologies.

Boron nitride nanotube (BNNT) films were grown on silicon/silicon dioxide (Si/SiO(2)) substrates by a catalytic chemical vapor deposition (CVD) method in a horizontal electric furnace. The effects of growth temperature and catalyst concentration on the morphology of the films and the structure of individual BNNTs were systematically investigated. The BNNT films grown at 1200 and 1300 °C consisted of a homogeneous dispersion of separate tubes in random directions with average outer diameters of ~30 and ~60 nm, respectively. Meanwhile, the films grown at 1400 °C comprised of BNNT bundles in a flower-like morphology, which included thick tubes with average diameters of ~100 nm surrounded by very thin ones with diameters down to ~10 nm. In addition, low catalyst concentration led to the formation of BNNT films composed of entangled curly tubes, while high catalyst content resulted in very thick tubes with diameters up to ~350 nm in a semierect flower-like morphology. Extensive transmission electron microscopy (TEM) investigations revealed the diameter-dependent growth mechanisms for BNNTs; namely, thin and thick tubes with closed ends grew by base-growth and tip-growth mechanisms, respectively. However, high catalyst concentration motivated the formation of filled-with-catalyst BNNTs, which grew open-ended with a base-growth mechanism.