Artificial sodium-selective ionic device based on crown-ether crystals with subnanometer pores.

ABSTRACT: Biological sodium channels ferry sodium ions across the lipid membrane while rejecting potassium ions and other metal ions. Realizing such ion selectivity in an artificial solid-state ionic device will enable new separation technologies but remains highly challenging. In this work, we report an artificial sodium-selective ionic device, built on synthesized porous crown-ether crystals which consist of densely packed 0.26-nm-wide pores. The Na⁺ selectivity of the artificial sodium-selective ionic device reached 15 against K⁺, which is comparable to the biological counterpart, 523 against Ca^2 +, which is nearly two orders of magnitude higher than the biological one, and 1128 against Mg^2 +. The selectivity may arise from the size effect and molec

SUBMITTER: Ye T 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8410819 | biostudies-literature | 2021 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature