Nanoparticles articles within Nature Materials

Featured

  • News & Views |

    An efficient scheme that realizes broad tunability of photon upconversion in core–shell nanoparticles may lead to applications in biosensing, security labelling and more.

    • Nicholas Kotov

  • News & Views |

    The synthesis of a family of plate-like semiconductor nanocrystals yields solutions of small quantum wells with excellent optical properties.

    • Gregory D. Scholes

  • Letter |

    Highly monodisperse silver polyhedral nanocrystals passivated with polymers are shown to behave as quasi-hard particles that self-assemble by sedimentation into millimetre-sized supercrystals, which correspond to the particles' three-dimensional densest packings. Monte Carlo simulations confirm the observed self-assembled structures, including an exotic structure for octahedra that is stabilized by depletion forces induced by an excess of polymer in solution.

    • Joel Henzie
    • , Michael Grünwald
    •  & Peidong Yang

  • News & Views |

    Suspensions of octapod-shaped nanocrystals are seen to spontaneously interlock into chains, which in turn aggregate side-by-side to form three-dimensional crystals. The observed hierarchical self-assembly can be explained by the octapod's shape and the solvent-tunable van der Waals interactions.

    • Sara M. Rupich
    •  & Dmitri V. Talapin

  • News & Views |

    Molecular ligands are widely used to functionalize gold nanoparticles, but their influence on the particle structure has been difficult to probe. Coherent X-ray diffraction has now reached sufficient sensitivity to resolve adsorption-induced near-surface stress in a single nanocrystal.

    • Frank Schreiber

  • Letter |

    Semiconductor nanocrystals have for many years attracted attention for their optical properties and their potential use as superior fluorescence emitters. It is now shown that nanoplatelets can be controllably synthesized and have even more attractive properties.

    • S. Ithurria
    • , M. D. Tessier
    •  & Al. L. Efros

  • Article |

    Nonlinear optical upconversion processes in nanoparticles, which convert long-wavelength light into short-wavelength emission, are promising for applications such as biological imaging, optical data storage and others. The flexible tuning of upconversion properties in core–shell nanoparticles now offers unprecedented control over the nonlinear optical properties of the nanoparticles.

    • Feng Wang
    • , Renren Deng
    •  & Xiaogang Liu

  • Letter |

    Monodisperse octapod-shaped inorganic nanocrystals suspended in suitable solvents are shown to self-assemble into chains of interlocked octapods, which in turn aggregate to form three-dimensional crystals. Such hierarchical self-assembly is supported by a simulation model of the octapods, which shows that the favourable interlocked configuration is encoded in the octapod’s shape.

    • Karol Miszta
    • , Joost de Graaf
    •  & Liberato Manna

  • Letter |

    Self-assembled monolayers of thiols have applications ranging from surface coatings to nanomechanical sensors, where they transmit analyte-induced stress to a cantilever detector. For gold nanocrystals it is now shown that the adsorption of propanethiol alone can induce large chemical stress, with different directionality on curved and flat surfaces.

    • Moyu Watari
    • , Rachel A. McKendry
    •  & Ian K. Robinson

  • Commentary |

    As complex new materials such as nanoparticles increasingly make their way into commercial products, regulatory frameworks need to overcome a number of key challenges to remain fit for purpose.

    • Andrew Maynard
    • , Diana Bowman
    •  & Graeme Hodge

  • Article |

    A two-component nanoparticle system that communicates and enhances in vivo drug delivery and diagnostics has been devised. The system comprises ‘signalling’ nanoparticles that target tumours and then broadcast the tumour’s location to ’receiving’ nanoparticles in circulation, which carry therapeutic or diagnostic cargos, hence amplifying tumour targeting.

    • Geoffrey von Maltzahn
    • , Ji-Ho Park
    •  & Sangeeta N. Bhatia

  • Article |

    Plasmonic resonances are widely used for sensing applications. The plasmon resonance of a single nanoantenna structure is now used to detect changes in the dielectric properties of a nearby palladium nanoparticle exposed to hydrogen gas, enabling highly sensitive sensing in ultrasmall volumes. The approach can be easily extended to other sensing and catalysis schemes.

    • Na Liu
    • , Ming L. Tang
    •  & A. Paul Alivisatos

  • Article |

    Production of chemical fuels by solar energy is an attractive and sustainable solution to our energy problems. A highly active photocathode, consisting of electrodeposited cuprous oxide with platinum nanoparticles is now activated for hydrogen evolution resulting from photelectrochemical water reduction.

    • Adriana Paracchino
    • , Vincent Laporte
    •  & Elijah Thimsen

  • News & Views |

    By wrapping a ligand-functionalized lipid membrane around a silica core, nanoparticles with a fluid surface are created. These combine unprecedented specificity in binding to cancer cells with the combinatorial delivery of drug cocktails.

    • Darrell J. Irvine

  • News & Views |

    Embedding magnesium nanoparticles in a gas-selective polymer prevents their oxidation under ambient conditions while enabling reversible hydrogen storage.

    • Petra E. de Jongh

  • Article |

    Explaining why interactions of metal particles with oxide supports can improve their catalytic performance has proved challenging. The origin and nature of metal–oxide interactions on industrially important platinum–ceria catalysts are now clarified, together with the dependence of the catalytic activity on the structure of the support.

    • Georgi N. Vayssilov
    • , Yaroslava Lykhach
    •  & Jörg Libuda

  • News & Views |

    The DNA-mediated assembly of anisotropic gold nanoparticles shows the importance of particle shape in the controlled formation of DNA–nanoparticle superlattices.

    • Sharon C. Glotzer
    •  & Joshua A. Anderson

  • Letter |

    The formation of a NaTl lattice structure by DNA-mediated assembly of gold nanoparticles and virus-like protein nanoparticles is reported. The inorganic and organic components each form diamond-like frameworks that interpenetrate to give the NaTl lattice. These diamond-like structures are of interest for potential applications as photonic materials.

    • Petr Cigler
    • , Abigail K. R. Lytton-Jean
    •  & Sung Yong Park

  • Letter |

    The improvement of catalysts for the oxygen-reduction reaction is an important challenge for fuel cells and other electrochemical-energy technologies. A composite nanoporous Ni–Pt alloy with a tailored geometric architecture is now shown to exhibit high mass activity for oxygen reduction.

    • J. Snyder
    • , T. Fujita
    •  & J. Erlebacher

  • Letter |

    DNA-functionalized, anisotropic nanostructures, such as triangular nanoprisms and nanorods, are shown to assemble by means of DNA hybridization into colloidal crystal structures. The crystallization parameters of these nanostructures, and hence the dimensionality and symmetry of the resultant superlattice, are strongly influenced by particle shape.

    • Matthew R. Jones
    • , Robert J. Macfarlane
    •  & Chad A. Mirkin

  • Letter |

    The typical high-surface-area and voids of nanoscale cage structures make them attractive for catalysis, gas storage and drug delivery. Contrary to other metal–semiconductor particles, a ruthenium cage is now shown to grow selectively on the edges of a faceted copper sulphide nanocrystal.

    • Janet E. Macdonald
    • , Maya Bar Sadan
    •  & Uri Banin

  • News & Views |

    A liquid/air interface provides an effective platform for organizing thin molecular layers that can be transferred to solid surfaces. It is now shown that liquid-interface assembly is effective for generating extensive membranes of binary nanocrystal superlattices.

    • Brian A. Korgel

  • News & Views |

    Imprinting molecular memory on the surface of polymer nanoparticles creates artificial antibodies that can recognize and neutralize a toxic peptide in vivo.

    • Karsten Haupt

  • Letter |

    Mucosal diseases are becoming more prevalent and needle-free vaccines could be instrumental in combating this. A nanometre-sized hydrogel consisting of a cationic type of cholesteryl group bearing pullulan has now been used as an intranasal vaccine-delivery system.

    • Tomonori Nochi
    • , Yoshikazu Yuki
    •  & Hiroshi Kiyono

  • Letter |

    When a superconductor is shrunk to the nanoscale, quantum size effects are predicted to strongly influence superconductivity. This is now demonstrated in Sn nanoparticles in which a reduction in size leads to a substantial enhancement of the superconducting gap.

    • Sangita Bose
    • , Antonio M. García-García
    •  & Klaus Kern

  • News & Views |

    By using drug-encapsulating nanoparticles as the basis for electrostatic assembly, it is possible to generate highly functional films that do double duty. These adaptable thin films can be used both for releasing the drug in a controlled fashion and for biological imaging.

    • Paula T. Hammond

  • Letter |

    Approaches for controlling surface wettability and liquid spreading are numerous and diverse, but introducing directionality to the control of these phenomena is far from trivial. Nanostructured surfaces are now used to allow the propagation of a liquid in a single direction, while constraining it in the other three directions.

    • Kuang-Han Chu
    • , Rong Xiao
    •  & Evelyn N. Wang

  • Article |

    Silicon-based lithium-ion batteries are attractive because in principle they offer higher specific capacities than conventional graphite. A hierarchical bottom-up approach is now used to prepare lithium-ion anodes with improved reversible capacities and stable electrochemical performance.

    • A. Magasinski
    • , P. Dixon
    •  & G. Yushin

  • Article |

    Counterintuitively, the exceptional strength of silks comes from β-sheet nanocrystals in which the key molecular interactions are weak hydrogen bonds. Simulations now show that nanoconfinement effects make β-sheet nanocrystals the size of a few nanometres stiffer, stronger and tougher than larger ones. These effects can be exploited to create materials with superior mechanical properties.

    • Sinan Keten
    • , Zhiping Xu
    •  & Markus J. Buehler

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