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Self-assembled barrel-like DNA nanostructures carrying active payloads and pre-programmed with logic operations to reconfigure in response to cell-surface cues can trigger a variety of intracellular functions.
A study reveals that spider orb webs fail in a nonlinear fashion, owing to the hierarchical organization of the silk proteins. The discovery may serve as inspiration for engineers for the design of aerial, light-weight, robust architectures.
The demonstration of strong coupling between electromagnetic fields and excited molecular states represents a powerful new strategy for controlling quantum-mechanical states and chemical reaction dynamics.
Self-assembled microsponges of hairpin RNA polymers achieve, with one thousand times lower concentration, the same degree of gene silencing in tumour-carrying mice as conventional nanoparticle-based siRNA delivery vehicles.
The pronounced temperature dependence of crystal-growth speed in phase-change materials not only rationalizes their favourable characteristics for non-volatile memory applications, but also suggests a profound new insight into their fundamental properties.
The finding that metallic glasses inherit their elastic properties from solvent atoms leads to a new understanding of the complex relationship between glassy structure, deformation and mechanical properties.
When quenching a liquid to form a glass, order-of-magnitude changes in cooling speed have small effects on the glass's properties. It is now shown that laser-assisted vapour deposition produces nanostructured glassy polymer films with a higher glass transition temperature and lower density than conventional quenched polymer glasses.
Understanding oxide dissolution processes on the molecular scale remains a challenge. A study on nanoscale oxides suggests a mechanism for dissolution that proceeds through the formation of oxygen-stuffed metastable structures.
Materials science and technology could offer the opportunity to address vital needs of African people. But improving the infrastructure for science education and dissemination of knowledge is the first step to take.
Mast cells induce protective immune responses through secretion of stimulatory granules. Microparticles modelled after mast-cell granules are now shown to replicate and enhance the functions of their natural counterparts and to direct the character of the resulting immunity.
The contact angle of water drops on substrates for which the wettability is dominated by van der Waals forces remains unchanged when the substrates are coated with a monolayer of graphene. Such 'wetting transparency' could lead to superior conducting and hydrophobic graphene-coated surfaces with tunable electronic properties.
The ability of laser interference potentials to trap and control colloidal particles opens up a new potential area of 'toy systems' displaying real physics. A beautiful example is the study of friction between colloidal crystals and a variety of artificially created surface potentials.
Limiting reliance on non-renewable fossil fuels inevitably depends on a more efficient utilization of solar energy. Materials scientists discuss the most viable approaches to produce high-energy-density fuels from sunlight that can be implemented in existing infrastructures.
For colloidal particles adsorbed at liquid/liquid interfaces, it is now found that the height of a particle above the interface equilibrates much more slowly than expected. Such a slow relaxation has major implications for the understanding of effective interactions between colloids at fluid interfaces.
The application of inhomogeneous strain to silicon photonic structures may lead to new optically active devices based on second-order nonlinear processes.
From magnetism, ferroelectricity and superconductivity to electrical and thermal properties, oxides show a broad range of phenomena of fundamental as well as practical relevance. Reviewed here are the emergent phenomena arising at the interface between oxide materials, which have attracted considerable interest based on advances in thin-film deposition techniques.
