Water compatible supramolecular polymers (WCSPs) combine aqueous compatibility with the reversibility and environmental responsiveness of supramolecular polymers. WCSPs have seen application across a number of fields, including stimuli-responsive materials, healable materials, and drug delivery, and are attracting increasing attention from the design, synthesis, and materials perspectives. In this review, we summarize the chemistry of WCSPs from 2016 to mid-2021. For the sake of discussion, we divide WCSPs into five categories based on the core supramolecular approaches at play, namely hydrogen-bonding arrays, electrostatic interactions, large π-conjugated subunits, host–guest interactions, and peptide-based systems, respectively. We discuss both synthesis and polymer structure, as well as the underlying design expectations. The goal of this overview is to deepen our understanding of the strategies that have been exploited to prepare WCSPs, as well as their properties and uses. Thus, a section devoted to potential applications is included in this review.

Water pollution is a global challenge. One general class of pollutants is anions, which collectively can have adverse effects on both human health and the environment. These impacts necessitate the development of new water purification technologies capable of addressing anionic pollutants. This review summarizes macrocycle-based approaches to anion extraction with a focus on systems reported by our group in recent years. These extractants remove targeted anions from aqueous source phases via three complementary modes: (1) liquid–liquid extraction involving two phase organic solvent/water systems, wherein the anions are ideally extracted from the aqueous phase into the organic phase; (2) solvent swollen polymer networks (gels) that adsorb anions from water; (3) solids that adsorb anions directly. The present treatment is organized according to the nature of the receptors used as the putative extractants, specifically calix[4]pyrrole-based systems, Schiff-base macrocycles, and approaches that rely on so-called “Texas-sized” molecular boxes.

A series of micro-sized MgO catalysts with various morphologies have been prepared by varying the reaction temperature and stirring time during precipitation, and were investigated for the production of glycerol carbonate from the transesterification of glycerol with dimethyl carbonate. In contrast to other morphologies of MgO (e.g., rod-like, spherical, flower-like and nest-like), trapezoidal MgO demonstrated a superior performance with a yield of glycerol carbonate of more than 99%. Various techniques including N₂ physical adsorption, XRD, CO₂ chemical adsorption and EDS revealed that the unique catalytic activity of trapezoidal MgO was related to its lower specific surface area, bigger crystallite size, weaker surface basicity and fewer Mg atom vacancies compared to the other morphologies of MgO. The experimental conditions (e.g., the catalyst amount, solvent, reaction temperature and molar ratio between glycerol and dimethyl carbonate) were also found to play crucial roles in determining the yield of glycerol carbonate. Furthermore, CO₂-TPD profiles and FT-IR spectra indicated that the weak surface basic sites occurring at 150 °C and the CO₃ ²⁻ stretching vibration around 1448 cm⁻¹ were responsible for the catalytic activity of the developed trapezoidal MgO in regeneration.

Phenol is an important chemical material that is widely used in industry. Currently, phenol is dominantly produced by the well-known three-step cumene process, which suffers from severe drawbacks. Therefore, developing a green, sustainable, and economical strategy for the production of phenol directly from benzene is urgently needed. In recent years, the photocatalytic hydroxylation of benzene to phenol, which is economically feasible and could be performed under mild conditions, has attracted more attention, and development of highly efficient photocatalyst would be a key issue in this field. In this review, we systematically introduce the recent achievements of photocatalytic hydroxylation of benzene to phenol from 2015 to mid-2022, and various heterogeneous photocatalysts are comprehensively reviewed, including semiconductors, polyoxometalates (POMs), graphitic carbon nitride (g-C₃N₄), metal–organic frameworks (MOFs), carbon materials, and some other types of photocatalysts. Much effort is focused on the physical and chemical approaches for modification of these photocatalysts. The challenges and future promising directions for further enhancing the catalytic performances in photocatalytic hydroxylation of benzene are discussed in the end.