Browse Articles

The output mechanical energy densities of ferroelectric polymers remain orders of magnitude smaller than those of piezoelectric ceramics and crystals, limiting their applications in soft actuators. But polymer composites subject to an electro-thermally driven ferroelectric phase transition under low electric fields are now shown to have giant actuation strains and large energy densities.

Piezoelectric actuators play a critical role in precision positioning devices; however, materials with high actuation strain and mechanical energy density are rare. Here a composite of poly(vinylidene fluoride) and TiO₂ demonstrates superior performance in these metrics, with the ferroelectric transition driven by Joule heating.

Combining a tungsten disulfide monolayer and a topologically protected bound state in the continuum formed by a one-dimensional photonic crystal, strong light–matter interaction enhancement and large exciton–polariton nonlinearities at room temperature are demonstrated.

Photopolymerizable hydrogels enable optical clearance and high homogeneous expansion for high-resolution optical imaging of cells embedded within degradable hydrogels.

Detailed structures of both solvated corona chains and sub-nanometre crystalline core lattice of polymer-based nanofibres in solution are obtained using high-resolution cryo-electron microscopy.

Superionic materials are of interest for solid-state batteries or thermoelectrics, yet a clear understanding of the atomistic mechanisms is lacking. Here it is shown that transverse acoustic phonons persist above the superionic transition in argyrodite Ag₈SnSe₆, and that the free-Se sublattice controls fast Ag cation diffusion.

An ultra-microporous metal–organic framework glass foam shows outstanding gas sieving properties for challenging gas mixtures.

A strategy of using a high ligand/metal ion concentration ratio eliminates lattice defects in polycrystalline zirconium metal–organic framework membranes, enhancing their molecular sieving performance.

The authors report subatomic precision in measuring the displacement of a nanowire. Such precision is achieved by employing deep-learning enabled analysis of single-shot scattering of topologically structured superoscillatory illumination.

Membranes formed from porous adsorbents can improve the economics of industrially difficult separations but require support materials that reduce gas permeance. Here an amorphous glassy foam membrane without a support is formed from ZIF-62 that shows high selectivity and permeance for CH₄/N₂ separations.

MOF membranes can present exceptional molecular-sieving properties, but lattice defects arising from incomplete cluster coordination can hinder this. Here a strategy for the elimination of lattice defects by increasing the ligand to secondary building unit ratio is proposed and demonstrated.

A low-valence carbon-doped ruthenium oxide-based catalytic material achieved a catalytic trinity of superior activity, selectivity and stability during the conversion of carbon dioxide into methane at low temperatures.

Activating CO₂ to form methane is a potential strategy for energy decarbonization, but to activate CO₂ typically requires high temperatures. Here a ruthenium oxycarbonate is presented that forms by carbon interstitial doping of RuO₂, and this catalyst enables CO₂ activation at 50 °C.

Employing terahertz nanoscopy, we image highly confined, in-plane anisotropic acoustic terahertz plasmon polaritons in monoclinic Ag₂Te platelets placed above a Au layer, verifying a linear dispersion and elliptical isofrequency contour in momentum space.

In heavily hole-doped cuprates, superconductivity does not die by simply dissolving into a uniform metal due to the lack of pairing, but rather survives by shattering into nanoscale superconducting puddles.

Local vibrational modes at substitutional impurities in monolayer graphene are resolved with a sensitivity at the chemical bonding level, revealing the impacts of different chemical configurations and mass of impurity atoms on the defect-perturbed vibrational properties.

Ferroelectrics have already impacted scientific research and commercial applications, but they still show plenty of potential to surprise.

Antiferromagnetism has a vanishing total magnetization and thus is extremely challenging to manipulate. Now, circularly polarized light is shown to efficiently detect, induce and switch a unique class of antiferromagnets.