Porous polymer-nanocrystals (NCs) organic-inorganic nanocomposites with integrated functions, enhanced stability, and controlled morphology are highly demanded across various fields due to their unique physicochemical properties. Herein, uniform macroporous polystyrene (MPS) microspheres loaded with various functional NCs were designed and synthesized through a facile and controllable impregnation method, enabling the applications of nanocrystals in solutions and their convenient recycling and recovery. As a typical example, Ag-loaded MPS composite (denoted as Ag@MPS) microspheres are synthesized and they exhibit uniform spherical morphology, good dispersion, and an interconnected macroporous structure. Benefiting from these distinctive structural features, Ag@MPS microspheres demonstrate exceptional catalytic performance in the reduction of 4-nitrophenol, achieving a fast reaction rate constant of 0.394 min⁻¹ at room temperature. Moreover, owing to the highly accessible Ag NCs in the macroporous polystyrene (PS) matrix, the Ag@MPS microspheres display superior antibacterial activity, with antibacterial rates of 93% against Gram-positive bacteria and 99% against Gram-negative bacteria.

Flexible room-temperature gas sensors with good adaptability to various surfaces and low energy consumption hold a great promise for different applications such as environmental monitoring and human exhalation detection. However, the development of flexible sensing devices with stable and superior monitoring capability is still restricted by the insufficient selectivity or sensitivity at low temperatures. In this study, a simultaneous etching and oxidation polymerization strategy is developed toward the synthesis of porous polypyrrole (PPy)/Ti₃C₂T_x MXene nanocomposites. In the nanocomposites, PPy nanosheets align vertically on the surface of Ti₃C₂T_x, forming numerous open and porous channels. As a result, the PPy/Ti₃C₂T_x-based flexible sensor shows highly exposed active sites and superior ammonia sensing performances at room temperature with good selectivity, high sensitivity, fast response rate, and a low detection limit of 375 ppb. The sensor can exhibit stable and reliable sensitivity under different bending angles and even after 100 bending cycles. Moreover, the PPy/Ti₃C₂T_x nanocomposites can be integrated into a portable flexible wireless sensor for remote and real-time ammonia monitoring, exhibiting great potentials in various applications.

As a typical family of volatile toxic compounds, benzene derivatives are massive emission in industrial production and the automobile field, causing serious threat to human and environment. The reliable and convenient detection of low concentration benzene derivatives based on intelligent gas sensor is urgent and of great significance for environmental protection. Herein, through heteroatomic doping engineering, rare-earth gadolinium (Gd) doped mesoporous WO₃ with uniform mesopores (15.7–18.1 nm), tunable high specific surface area (52–55 m²·g⁻¹), and customized crystalline pore walls, was designed and utilized to fabricate highly sensitive gas sensors toward benzene derivatives, such as ethylbenzene. Thanks to the high-density oxygen vacancies (O_V) and significantly increased defects (W⁵⁺) produced by Gd atoms doping into the lattice of WO₃ octahedron, Gd-doped mesoporous WO₃ exhibited excellent ethylbenzene sensing performance, including high response (237 vs. 50 ppm), rapid response–recovery dynamic (13 s/25 s vs. 50 ppm), and extremely low theoretical detection limit of 24 ppb. The in-situ diffuse reflectance infrared Fourier transform and gas chromatograph-mass spectrometry results revealed the gas sensing process underwent a catalytic oxidation conversion of ethylbenzene into alcohol species, benzaldehyde, acetophenone, and carboxylate species along with the resistance change of the Gd-doped mesoporous WO₃ based sensor. Moreover, a portable smart gas sensing module was fabricated and demonstrated for real-time detecting ethylbenzene, which provided new ideas to design heteroatom doped mesoporous materials for intelligent sensors.

Magnetic assembly at the nanoscale level brings potential possibilities in obtaining novel delicate nanostructures with unique physical, photonic or electronic properties. Interface surfactant micelle-directed assembly strategy holds great promising in fabricating ordered mesoporous materials with multifunctionality and pore parameter tunability. Combing these, herein, one-dimensional (1D) nanochains with well-aligned silica-coated magnetic particles as core and mesoporous aluminosilicate as shell are rational fabricated for the first time through magnetic field induced interface coassembly in biliquid system followed by the incorporation of Al species via in-situ chemical modification and transformation strategy. The obtained magnetic mesoporous aluminosilicate nanochains (MMAS-NCs) possess well-defined core–shell–shell sandwich nanostructure, tunable perpendicular mesopore channels in the shell (2.7–7.6 nm), high surface area (359 m²·g^-1), abundant acidic sites, and superparamagnetism with a magnetization saturation of 13.8 emu·g^-1. Thanks to the unique properties, the MMAS-NCs exhibit excellent performance in acting as magnetically recyclable superior solid acid catalysts and nanostirrers with high conversion of over 96.8%, selectivity of 95.0% in the deprotection reaction of benzaldehyde dimethylacetal to benzaldehyde. Moreover, MMAS-NCs exhibit an interesting pore size effect on the catalytic activity, namely, in the pore size range of 2–8 nm, the catalysts with larger pores show significantly enhanced catalytic activity due to the balanced mass transport and density of surface active sites.

Hollow TiO_2–X porous microspheres consisted of numerous well-crystalline nanocrystals with superior structural integrity and robust hollow interior were synthesized by a facile sol-gel template-assisted approach and two-step carbonprotected calcination method, together with hydrogenation treatment. They exhibit a uniform diameter of ~470 nm with a thin porous wall shell of ~50 nm in thickness. The Brunauer-Emmett-Teller (BET) surface area and pore volume are ~19 m²/g and 0.07 cm³/g, respectively. These hollow TiO_2–X porous microspheres demonstrated excellent lithium storage performance with stable capacity retention for over 300 cycles (a high capacity of 151 mAh/g can be obtained up to 300 cycles at 1 C, retaining 81.6% of the initial capacity of 185 mAh/g) and enhanced rate capability even up to 10 C (222, 192, 121, and 92.1 mAh/g at current rates of 0.5, 1, 5, and 10 C, respectively). The intrinsic increased conductivity of the hydrogenated TiO₂ microspheres and their robust hollow structure beneficial for lithium ion-electron diffusion and mitigating the structural strain synergistically contribute to the remarkable improvements in their cycling stability and rate performance.

Magnetic yolk-shell structured anatase-based microspheres were fabricated through successive and facile sol-gel coating on magnetite particles, followed by annealing treatments. Upon loading with gold nanoparticles, the obtained functional magnetic microspheres as heterogeneous catalysts showed superior performance in catalyzing the epoxidation of styrene with extraordinary high conversion (89.5%) and selectivity (90.8%) towards styrene oxide. It is believed that the construction process of these fascinating materials features many implications for creating other functional nanocomposites.