Materials for devices articles within Nature Communications

Featured

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Interfacing living systems with electronics for biosensing and biocomputing applications is challenging. Here, Gao et al. present hybrid transistors with electroactive bacteria capable of extracellular electron transfer, enabling transduction of biological computations to electrical readouts.

    • Yang Gao
    • , Yuchen Zhou
    •  & Benjamin K. Keitz
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Researchers showcase an integrated photonic device with monocrystalline CsPbBr3 perovskite. Employing top-down etching approach, it introduces for micro lasers, beam splitters, X-couplers, Mach-Zehnder interferometers on perovskite films. This opens avenues for integrating perovskite semiconductors into optical chips, promising advancements in information and computing science.

    • Qi Han
    • , Jun Wang
    •  & Li Ji
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Frequency converters for wireless internet of things applications typically require separate circuits for different functions, causing energy and performance inefficiencies. Using an epitaxially grown VO2 memristor array, Liu et al. present a frequency converter with in-situ frequency synthesis and mix functionality.

    • Chang Liu
    • , Pek Jun Tiw
    •  & Yuchao Yang
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Inspired by the swift swingable abdomen, conducting canals, and body setae of Stenus comma, the authors present a swift, agile untethered insect-scale soft propulsor, offering new insights into systematically bio-inspired artificial soft robots.

    • Xingxing Ke
    • , Haochen Yong
    •  & Zhigang Wu
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Polymerization degree plays a vital role in controlling material properties and batch-to-batch variations in device performance of polymer solar cells. Here, authors develop in-situ photoluminescence system in tandem to track and estimate the polymerization degree of organic photovoltaic materials.

    • Lin-Yong Xu
    • , Wei Wang
    •  & Jie Min
  • Article
    | Open Access

    New detector materials are crucial for radiation beam monitoring in dosimeters and X-ray imaging. The authors report a solution-grown biocompatible organic single crystalline semiconductor for real-time spectral detection of charged particles with single-particle sensitivity, X-ray detection and imaging.

    • Dou Zhao
    • , Ruiling Gao
    •  & Yadong Xu
  • Article
    | Open Access

    It is challenging to achieve simultaneous robustness, permeability and high electrical performance when patterning textile electronics. Here, the authors report an in-textile photolithography method for precise metal patterns while maintaining the 3D porous structure for wearable textile electronics.

    • Pengwei Wang
    • , Xiaohao Ma
    •  & Zijian Zheng
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Hf0.5Zr0.5O2 ferroelectric capacitors undergo a continuous transition from a positive effective to a fully inverted negative piezoelectric coefficient d33 upon electrical cycling. With proper ac training, both the net effective and the local piezoresponses can be nullified while the polarization is kept fully switchable.

    • Haidong Lu
    • , Dong-Jik Kim
    •  & Catherine Dubourdieu
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Recent work has demonstrated the potential of polycrystalIine antiferromagnetic materials for spintronics. Here the authors report evidence of magnetic phase transitions in a polycrystalline non-collinear antiferromagnet, which are explained by a phenomenological model with topological orbital momenta.

    • Sihao Deng
    • , Olena Gomonay
    •  & Christoph Sürgers
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Lightweight flexible piezoelectric polymers are demanded for various applications, but restricted by the low instinctively piezoelectric coefficient and complex poling process. Here, the authors develop a high performance lightweight, flexible self-poled piezoelectric polymer composite towards sustainable self-powered sensing and energy harvesting.

    • Zhao-Xia Huang
    • , Lan-Wei Li
    •  & Jin-Ping Qu
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Most multi-degrees-of-freedom systems are composed of several piezoelectric stacks, leading to cumbersome and complicated structures. Here, the authors propose a piezo metasurface to achieve various types of high strains in a wide frequency range.

    • Liao Qiao
    • , Xiangyu Gao
    •  & Fei Li
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Introducing biomaterials into semiconductors to manifest bio-mimetic functionality is impactful to trigger new enhancement mechanisms. Here, the authors utilize different types of biomolecules to regulate the perovskite crystal lattice and endow a mechanism for stabilizing the metastable lattice.

    • Haodong Wu
    • , Yuchen Hou
    •  & Kai Wang
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Gate-type field emission cathodes based on carbon nanotubes face challenges of achieving high E-beam transmittance to avoid the collision with the gate to form irreversible damages. Here, the authors present a self-charging gate to control the E-beam trajectory by inducing a local electric field.

    • Dongyang Xiao
    • , Huanhuan Du
    •  & Peiyi Song
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Electrical control of topological magnets is of great interest for future spintronic applications. Here, the authors demonstrate the effective manipulation of antiferromagnetic order in a Weyl semimetal using orbital torques, with implications for neuromorphic device applications.

    • Zhenyi Zheng
    • , Tao Zeng
    •  & Jingsheng Chen
  • Article
    | Open Access

    L. Rocchino et al. experimentally demonstrate a magnetic field effect transistor based on the Weyl semimetal NbP as the active channel material. A gate magnetic field is generated by current flowing in an integrated superconductor NbN. The device operation relies on the extreme magnetoresistance of the NbP.

    • Lorenzo Rocchino
    • , Federico Balduini
    •  & Cezar B. Zota
  • Article
    | Open Access

    The in-depth study on the sweat–blood partitioning mechanisms of amino acids is promising for noninvasive metabolic monitoring. Here, the authors develop a wearable biochip for sweat phenylalanine multimodal analysis aimed at tracking exercise metabolic risk and exploring the sweat–blood correlation.

    • Bowen Zhong
    • , Xiaokun Qin
    •  & Lili Wang
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Conventional deoxygenation methods typically result in inevitable trace oxygen residue in organic semiconductors. Here, Huang et al. reports a non-destructive soft-plasma treatment for deoxygenation and that removal of trace oxygen can be used to modulate p-type characteristics.

    • Yinan Huang
    • , Kunjie Wu
    •  & Wenping Hu
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Organic neural implants hold considerable promise for biocompatible neural interfaces. Here, the authors employ polymer-based organic electrochemical diodes and transistors to develop neuron-sized complex circuits, enabling multiplexing without crosstalk and demonstrate that, when integrated onto ultra-thin plastic, these circuits achieve high performance while maintaining minimal invasiveness.

    • Ilke Uguz
    • , David Ohayon
    •  & Kenneth L. Shepard
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Designing efficient high-density crossbar arrays are nowadays highly demanded for many artificial intelligence applications. Here, the authors propose a two-terminal ferroelectric fin diode non-volatile memory in which a ferroelectric capacitor and a fin-like semiconductor channel are combined to share both top and bottom electrodes with high performance and easy fabrication process

    • Guangdi Feng
    • , Qiuxiang Zhu
    •  & Chungang Duan
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Harvesting biomechanical energy from cardiac motion is an attractive power source for implantable bioelectronic devices. Here, the authors report a battery-free, transcatheter, self-powered intracardiac pacemaker for the treatment of arrhythmia in large animal models.

    • Zhuo Liu
    • , Yiran Hu
    •  & Zhong Lin Wang
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Microneedle patches that can actively address individual needles are challenging to realize. Here, the authors introduce a spatiotemporal on-demand patch for precise and personalized drug delivery, utilizing electrically triggered control with drug-loaded microneedles and biocompatible metallic membranes.

    • Yihang Wang
    • , Zeka Chen
    •  & Wubin Bai
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Thermistors typically read at DC or low frequencies have limited temperature-sensing ranges. Here, authors show how a radio frequency readout can overcome the decades-old range limitation of thermistors, while creating a wireless interface for a soft thermistor composite through antennas and RFID.

    • Mahmoud Wagih
    • , Junjie Shi
    •  & Steve Beeby
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Electro-active ionic soft actuators generally present slow responses and poor durability when are applied as artificial muscles. Here, the authors describe a polyelectrolyte membrane based on the assembly of Nafion molecules into micelles with efficient ionic conducting pathways for electro-ionic soft actuators and soft robotics with fast responses and long durability.

    • Van Hiep Nguyen
    • , Saewoong Oh
    •  & Il-Kwon Oh
  • Article
    | Open Access

    In this work, authors demonstrate highly stretchable conductive porous elastomers that can achieve up to 1200% strain with low or negative Poisson’s ratios by uniaxial, biaxial, and triaxial hot-pressing strategies.

    • Xiaoyu Zhang
    • , Qi Sun
    •  & Guoqing Zu
  • Article
    | Open Access

    The sign of longitudinal piezoelectric coefficients is typically positive. Here, the authors tune the sign of the linear piezoelectric coefficient of HfO2 from positive to negative via epitaxial strain, finding nonlinear and parabolic piezoelectric behaviors at tensile epitaxial strain.

    • Hao Cheng
    • , Peijie Jiao
    •  & Yurong Yang
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Nanoscale ferroelectric domains called electric bubbles are shown to behave as dynamical particles. Using atomistic simulations and experiments, the authors reveal a bubble liquid phase and demonstrate teleportation-like displacements of single bubbles.

    • S. Prokhorenko
    • , Y. Nahas
    •  & L. Bellaiche
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Hydrogen-bonded organic frameworks as stimuli responsive multistate structures show potential in the field of resistive switching. Here, the authors report a 0D+1D hydrogen-bonded polycatenation non-covalent organic framework showing reversible transformation of multistate-structures triggered by electrical field and temperature, enabling reversibly switchable resistive random-access memory and write-once-read-many-times memory behavior.

    • Shimin Chen
    • , Yan Ju
    •  & Zhangjing Zhang
  • Article
    | Open Access

    The water stability of perovskites remains challenging due to their intrinsic ionic nature. Here, the authors present water stable perovskite X-ray imager driven by strong cation-π interactions between organic cations and a complete release of microstrain during dimension transformation process.

    • Wanting Pan
    • , Yuhong He
    •  & Haotong Wei
  • Article
    | Open Access

    The simultaneous scaling down of the channel length and gate length of 2D transistors remains challenging. Here, the authors report a self-alignment process to fabricate vertical MoS2 transistors with sub-1 nm gate length and sub−50 nm channel length, exhibiting on-off ratios over 105 and on-state currents of 250 μA/μm at 4 V bias.

    • Liting Liu
    • , Yang Chen
    •  & Yuan Liu
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Designing memristor-integrated passive crossbar arrays to accelerate artificial neural networks with high reliability remains a challenge. Here, the authors propose a self-rectifying resistive switching device incorporated into a crossbar array with a density of 1 kb whose operational performance is assessed in terms of defected-cell proportion, reading margin, and selection functionality.

    • Kanghyeok Jeon
    • , Jin Joo Ryu
    •  & Gun Hwan Kim
  • Article
    | Open Access

    The design of multifunctional platforms with tunable spectroscopic and fluorescent properties that span the ultraviolet, visible, and near-infrared spectral regions remains challenging. Here, the authors report an actuator-type system that leverages a readily-prepared, easily-processable, and exceptionally-stable nonacene-like molecule to achieve multiple complementary dynamic operating modes.

    • Preeta Pratakshya
    • , Chengyi Xu
    •  & Alon A. Gorodetsky
  • Article
    | Open Access

    Gas sensors typically detect only few specific gases; the authors show a broad-spectrum sensor based on correlated 2-dimensional electron gas (C-2DEG), which detects various gases quantitatively and measures partial pressures, through a purely physical mechanism.

    • Yuhao Hong
    • , Long Wei
    •  & Zhaoliang Liao
  • Article
    | Open Access

    In-sensor and near-sensor computing are emerging as the next-generation computing paradigm, for high-density and low-power sensory processing. Here, the authors report a fully hardware-implemented artificial visual system for versatile image processing based on multimodal-multifunctional optoelectronic resistive memory devices with optical and electrical resistive switching modes.

    • Guangdong Zhou
    • , Jie Li
    •  & Shukai Duan