Two kinds of dry water (DW) particles are prepared by mixing water and hydrophobic silica particles with nanometer or micrometer dimensions, and the two DW particles are found to have similar size distributions regardless of the size of the silica shell. The CO2 uptake kinetics of DW with nanometer (nanoshell) and micrometer shells (microshell) are measured, and both uptake rate and capacity show the obvious size effect of the silica shell. The DW with a microshell possesses a larger uptake capacity, whereas the DW with a nanoshell has a faster uptake rate. By comparing the uptake kinetics of soluble NH3 and CO2 further, we found that the microshell enhances the stability and the dispersion degree of DW and the nanoshell offers a shorter path for the transit of guest gas into the water core. Furthermore, molecular dynamics simulation is introduced to illustrate the nanosize effect of the silica shell on the initial step of the gas uptake. It is found that the concentration of gas molecules close to the silica shell is higher than that in the bulk water core. With the increase in the size of the silica shell, the amount of CO2 in the silica shell decreases, and it is easier for the gas uptake to reach steady state.

A series of garnet-type Lu2.97Al5−xScxO12:0.03Ce3+ (x=0, 0.3, 0.5, 0.7 and 1) phosphors have been synthesized by high temperature solid-state reaction. Phase structure, photoluminescence (PL) and thermal quenching properties dependence on Al3+/Sc3+ ratio of the Lu2.97(Al,Sc)5O12:0.03Ce3+ phosphors have been investigated. All the phosphors exhibit strong broad absorption bands in the range of 300 and 500 nm, with a green emission peak at about 511 nm under the blue light excitation of 445 nm. Slight blue-shift tendency of emission bands was observed after the substitution of Al3+ by Sc3+. Thermal stable PL properties via Al3+/Sc3+ substitution in the Lu3Al5O12:Ce3+ phosphor have been also studied.

Different rare earth (RE) ions dopants were added into the SrAl2SiO7:Eu2+ phosphors in order to enhance the phosphorescence properties, and the effect of the RE ions including Yb3+, Ce3+, Nd3+, Dy3+ and Tm3+, was comparatively investigated. It was found that Nd3+ addition improved the phosphorescence properties obviously among all the studied RE ions. Therefore, Sr1.96–xAl2SiO7:xEu2+,yNd3+ phosphors were studied in detail, and the optimum Eu2+ and Nd3+ concentrations were determined with the afterglow time of about 20 min. The phase structures, photoluminescence (PL) properties, long-lasting phosphorescence (LLP) properties, afterglow decay curves and thermo-luminescence (TL) for the selected phosphors during the corresponding study were investigated. All the phosphors exhibited green PL emission and LLP emission. There were two TL bands located at about 325 and 380 K for the studied samples, and the relationship between RE addition and phosphorescence properties was discussed.Comparison of the afterglow spectra for Sr1.96Al2SiO7:0.04Eu2+ and Sr1.92Al2SiO7:0.04Eu2+, 0.04RE3+ (RE=Yb, Ce, Nd, Dy, Tm) phosphors