Abstract In this paper, we report a simple and inexpensive procedure to make a composite material of cellulose fibers with embedded zinc micoparticles. This fibrous material is produced by sedimentation and is referred to as “Zinculose”. Zinculose increases the surface contact area between a sample fluid and zinc microparticles. The effect of different parameters including fiber content, zinc content, water volume, applied weight and its duration on the thickness of produced Zinculose were investigated. Results show that thickness depends on the amount of initial fiber and zinc while other parameters investigated had little to no effect. Measured porosity values for Zinculose ranged between 0.699 and 0.843. Characterization of flow in Zinculose exhibits a linear relationship between distance and the square root of time which is a distinctive feature of capillary driven flow in porous media. This is an important quality that allows Zinculose to be easily incorporated into any paper-based microfluidic device that requires a sample to flow and interact with zinc microparticles without disrupting the flow path between different sections of the device. An application is presented in which a strip of Zinculose is used to convert nitrate to nitrite. With the use of Zinculose in a paper-based microfluidic device, a conversion efficiency of 27% nitrate to nitrite was achieved. This represents a 36% enhancement over what has been previously published when zinc microparticles were not embedded within the fibers of the paper channel.

中文翻译：

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Zinculose：一种嵌入锌颗粒的新型纤维材料

摘要 在本文中，我们报道了一种简单且廉价的方法来制造嵌入锌微粒的纤维素纤维复合材料。这种纤维材料是通过沉淀产生的，被称为“Zinculose”。Zinculose 增加了样品流体和锌微粒之间的表面接触面积。研究了不同参数包括纤维含量、锌含量、水量、施加重量及其持续时间对生产的锌粉厚度的影响。结果表明，厚度取决于初始纤维和锌的量，而研究的其他参数几乎没有影响。Zinculose 的测量孔隙率值介于 0.699 和 0.843 之间。Zinculose 中的流动特征表现出距离和时间平方根之间的线性关系，这是多孔介质中毛细管驱动流动的一个显着特征。这是一个重要的品质，它使 Zinculose 可以很容易地结合到任何需要样品流动并与锌微粒相互作用的纸基微流体设备中，而不会破坏设备不同部分之间的流动路径。介绍了一个应用，其中使用 Zinculose 条将硝酸盐转化为亚硝酸盐。通过在纸基微流体装置中使用 Zinculose，实现了 27% 的硝酸盐到亚硝酸盐的转化效率。当锌微粒没有嵌入纸通道的纤维中时，这表示比之前发表的提高了 36%。