Volume 14 Issue 5, May 2019

Contrary to common belief, art, science and technology have always played off one another.

Experimenting with exotic phenomena using exotic media.

With their unique perspectives, artists can become part of the scientific process.

Rich in drama, the scientific enterprise is an ideal subject to elicit an emotional response in the public.

Artistic imagination can help drive scientific imagination.

Neuroscience as a form of abstract expressionism

Art galleries are the right setting to promote the dialogue between scientists and the general public.

Art-based absurd scenarios serve as a vector to challenge perceptions of emergent biotechnologies.

Built-in molecular motors in a porous crystal show unidirectional rotary motion fuelled by light.

Until recently, the family of 2D materials was missing one crucial member — 2D magnets. This Review presents an overview of the 2D magnets studied so far and of the heterostructures that can be realized by combining them with other 2D materials.

Lanthanide-doped nanoparticles could be used as labels for the imaging of biomolecules, potentially leading to a multicolour modality in electron microscopy.

While neutral-charge quantum dots in optically active WSe₂ do not show spin-valley initialization, localized holes possess a net spin and their spin-valley state can be selected with the helicity of the laser excitation.

Under the application of a magnetic field, the 2D electron gas in a gated MoS₂ monolayer becomes spin-polarized, the Coulomb interaction probably being key to the symmetry breaking.

Instead of using capacitively coupled charge sensors, which imply additional complexity in the device architecture, radiofrequency reflectometry on the gate defining the quantum dot can read out the spin state of a double quantum dot in a single shot.

Gate-tuning of a Fermi reservoir enables the deterministic loading of single electrons or holes into a localized quantum dot in a WSe₂ monolayer and the observation of hybrid excitons originating from strong, spin-conserving tunnelling between the dot and the reservoir.

Chitosan-functionalized single-walled carbon nanotubes enable selective gene delivery to the chloroplasts of mature living plants without external mechanical aid.

High aspect ratio nanomaterials enable efficient delivery of DNA into mature plant cells in a species-independent and non-integrating manner for plant genetic engineering applications.

Miniaturized gold nanorods are reliable NIR-II photoacoustic agents, showing higher photothermal stability, enhanced photoacoustic signal and more efficient agent-to-tumour delivery compared with their larger counterparts.

Tapered InP nanowire p–n junction arrays enable efficient broadband and high-speed room-temperature photodetection.

A scanning single-electron transistor-based method enables simultaneous visualization of voltage and current density of flowing electrons in two-dimensional systems with high sensitivity and minimal invasiveness

Overcrowded alkene-based motors are made part of the crystalline structure of a metal–organic framework. It is shown that they retain the same rotatory speed and unidirectionality as in solution.