In this report, an improvement of the electrical performance and stability of a silver nanowire (AgNW) transparent conductive coating (TCC) is presented. The TCC stability against oxidation is achieved by coating the AgNWs with a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) layer. As a result, a UV/ozone treatment has not affected the morphology of the AgNWs network and the PVA protection layer, unlike non-passivated TCC, which showed severe degradation. The irradiation with an intense pulsed ion beam (IPIB) of 200 ns duration and a current density of 30 A/cm² is used to increase the conductivity of the AgNWs network without degradation of the temperature-resistant PVA coating and decrease in the TCC transparency. Simulations have shown that, although the sample temperature reaches high values, the ultra-high heating and cooling rates, together with local annealing, enable the delicate thermal processing. The developed coatings and irradiation strategies are used to prepare and enhance the performance of AgNW-based transparent heaters. A single irradiation pulse increases the operating temperature of the transparent heater from 92 to 160 °C at a technologically relevant voltage of 12 V. The proposed technique shows a great promise in super-fast, low-temperature annealing of devices with temperature-sensitive components.

The development of interface-engineered, multifunctional nanostructured materials with controllable surface and magnetic properties remains a critical challenge in wastewater treatment and environmental remediation. In this work, a novel GO–CoFe₂O₄–Silicone Magnetic Sponge was successfully fabricated through the integration of graphene oxide and CoFe₂O₄ magnetic nanoparticles within a silicone-modified porous sponge matrix. The resulting material combines superhydrophobicity, oleophilicity, high adsorption capacity, and magnetic responsiveness in a single architecture. The prepared sponge exhibited a high water contact angle of 161.5°, confirming its superhydrophobic nature, while maintaining excellent structural integrity during repeated use. Vibrating sample magnetometry revealed clear ferrimagnetic behavior, enabling rapid magnetic manipulation and efficient recovery of the sponge from aqueous media. The GO–CoFe₂O₄–Silicone Magnetic Sponge demonstrated strong adsorption performance toward a wide range of oils and organic solvents, including chloroform, olive oil, toluene, ethanol, acetone, gasoline, and hexane, with adsorption capacities remaining stable over multiple cycles. Furthermore, the sponge showed outstanding separation efficiency exceeding 98.3% for various oil/water and organic solvent/water mixtures, both in batch and continuous vacuum-assisted separation systems. The adsorption capacity and separation efficiency were retained after repeated adsorption–desorption cycles, indicating excellent reusability and durability. Owing to its synergistic combination of surface chemistry, porous structure, and magnetic functionality, the GO–CoFe₂O₄–Silicone Magnetic Sponge represents a promising candidate for practical applications in oil spill cleanup and wastewater treatment.

Microplastics (MPs) are pervasive emerging contaminants in freshwater and drinking-water systems, and conventional treatment processes may achieve insufficient removal of smaller MP fractions. Membrane filtration provides an effective barrier to MPs; however, commercial ceramic membranes can be relatively expensive. In this work, low-cost porous ceramic membranes were fabricated by extrusion-based three-dimensional (3D) printing of a kaolin–rice husk paste, followed by sintering at 1200 °C. The removal of model spherical polyethylene (PE) and irregularly shaped polyethylene terephthalate (PET) MPs across different particle-size fractions was evaluated using dead-end filtration and benchmarked against a commercial ceramic membrane. The 3D-printed membrane removed 58.3 ± 3.6% of 1–10 µm PE particles, while complete removal was achieved for the 75–90, 300–355, and 600–710 µm PE fractions. For PET, removal efficiencies of 80.8 ± 0.9%, 94.9 ± 1.8%, and 100% were obtained for the 10–45, 45–75, and 75–150 µm fractions, respectively. By comparison, the commercial membrane achieved 100% removal across all PE and PET fractions tested. The fabricated membrane had a modal pore size of 0.80 µm and an estimated cost of USD 2.98, compared with USD 54.45 for the commercial 0.45 µm membrane. Thus, the 3D-printed membrane effectively removed medium and large MP fractions, while its estimated fabrication cost was approximately 94.5% lower than the purchase cost of the commercial membrane used for comparison. Although its larger pore size resulted in incomplete removal of the smallest MP fractions, the combination of effective removal of larger MPs and substantially lower estimated fabrication cost demonstrates the potential of extrusion-based 3D printing as an alternative approach for producing ceramic membranes for MP removal.