Volume 17 Issue 5, May 2022

An artificial spin ice, containing two types of nanomagnets, can perform reservoir computing with minor magnetic field loops and spin wave spectra acting as inputs and outputs, respectively.

A fast laser pulse stimulates the decay in a quantum dot and suppresses the timing uncertainty in the generation of single photons, which substantially improves the coherence of the source.

Nano-antennas generate optical recoil forces that can be used to independently control the direction and rotation of small objects.

A combination of periodic laser patterning, anisotropic thermal etching and endoepitaxial growth enables the realization of monolayer mosaic heterostructures with atomically sharp interfaces.

A new excitation scheme broadens the choice of colours for the near-infrared excitable photon avalanching nanoscale labels for super-resolution imaging.

A preclinical study reports a platform for the generation of dendritic cell-derived nanovesicles with enhanced immunostimulatory function, which demonstrate promising antitumoural activity in mouse models and might overcome some of the shortcomings of early-generation dendritic cell nanovaccines.

This Review discusses how artificial intelligence and machine learning algorithms can be used in combination with X-ray computed tomography to study the composition and the dynamics of microstructures in battery materials with nanoscale resolution.

A nanomagnetic artificial spin ice array with two types of nanomagnets can host both magnetic macrospins and vortices. This enables highly reconfigurable magnon behaviour, which is leveraged for hardware neuromorphic computation.

Deterministic single-photon sources are a key building block for photonic quantum technologies. Stimulated emission now helps tailoring spontaneous emission from a ladder-type three-level system in a single epitaxial quantum dot for bright polarized sources with a high photon purity and indistinguishability.

A microscopic robotic device is remotely controlled in two dimensions in all three degrees of freedom independently by the interaction between unfocused light and four plasmonic nanoantennas.

A low-cost plasmonic photocatalyst based on earth-abundant metals (Fe, Cu) maximizes solar energy conversion due to the concerted interplay of energies and interactions between reactants and hot carriers, thus producing aromatic amines with a high yield.

An endoepitaxy approach enables the realization of two-dimensional mosaic heterostructures with atomically sharp heterojunction interfaces.

A two-dimensional transition metal dichalcogenide-on-compound-semiconductor fabrication method enables the realization of an active matrix micro-LED display.

Phase-change memtransistive synapses enable the implementation of biomimetic neural algorithms to perform tasks such as sequential learning and stochastic Hopfield computing networks.

Current DNA computation techniques are slow in generating chemical outputs in response to chemical inputs and rely heavily on fluorescence readouts. Here, the authors introduce a new paradigm for DNA computation where the chemical input is processed and transduced into a mechanical output in the form of macroscopic locomotion using dynamic DNA-based motors.

A general mechanism, migrating photon avalanche, can generate large optical nonlinearity from various lanthanides emitters at the nanoscale.

Cancer vaccines based on endogenous modified dendritic cells can activate cytotoxic T cells in an antigen-specific manner, but the short life of dendritic cells on injection in the body limits the efficacy of the strategies. Here the authors design biomimetic nanovesicles derived from antigen-presenting dendritic cell membranes for cancer vaccination and the simultaneous delivery of immune co-stimulatory molecules, showing robust antitumour activity in animal models.

Killing cells via rupturing their plasma membrane offers an attractive strategy to treat drug-resistant cancers, but it is currently highly toxic due to its low specificity. In this paper, the authors design a nanoscale detergent that can sense subtle pH variations and transforms into an active membranolytic agent at tumour acidity, remaining inactive in healthy tissues.

Vitreous opacities, which are collagen aggregates that form in the eye and cause vision impairment (eye floaters), are currently treated with invasive surgical intervention or high-energy laser photoablation. In this paper, the authors show that exposing gold nanoparticles or indocyanine green to low-energy laser pulses generates vapour nanobubbles that can disrupt collagen aggregates in the eyes of rabbit, suggesting a milder strategy for the treatment of eye floaters.