Continuous-flow system for loading and refining metal-supported nanofibers toward scalable production

Nanocatalysts play a significant role in various valuable reactions, but the scalable production is constrained by the cumbersome and laborious washing in refining after loading active metals species. This work firstly presented a universal continuous-flow washing for simplifying the washing protocol based on the size-matching principle. With pore-size-selected filter membranes, excess or weakly anchored metal species can be carried away during liquid flow, while the solid nanofibers were efficiently collected. Secondly, to break through the volume limitations of the mixing kettle and realize scalable production, a home-made integrated loading-washing device was well designed and can achieved the loading and washing at one time. This device allowed liquid to flow through the support, where metal species to be loaded on while the excess metal species to be carried away. The optimized protocol increased the catalyst output per unit time from 10 mg/h to 500 mg/h, without the negative impact to catalytic performance and stability. This work provides a fresh ideal for achieving the scalable production of nanocatalysts from the perspective of simplifying the loading and refining.