Featured
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Electrolyte design for Li-ion batteries under extreme operating conditions
An electrolyte design strategy based on a group of soft solvents is used to achieve lithium-ion batteries that operate safely under extreme conditions without lithium plating and with the capability of fast charging.
- Jijian Xu
- , Jiaxun Zhang
- & Chunsheng Wang
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Research Highlight |
How to stop fleece clothes from fouling the sea: bring in the tiny brushes
Nylon coated with a non-toxic compound does not shed microfibres that can pollute the ocean.
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News & Views |
Light tailors the electronic properties of a model semiconductor
When a semiconductor material called black phosphorus is hit with intense laser light, the behaviour of its electrons is found to change. The discovery opens a route to time-dependent engineering of exotic electronic phases in solids.
- Alberto Crepaldi
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Article |
Vertical full-colour micro-LEDs via 2D materials-based layer transfer
We report full-colour, vertically stacked µLEDs that achieve exceptionally high array density (5,100 pixels per inch) and small size (4 µm) via a 2D material-based layer transfer technique, allowing the creation of full-colour µLED displays for augmented and virtual reality.
- Jiho Shin
- , Hyunseok Kim
- & Jeehwan Kim
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Article |
Pseudospin-selective Floquet band engineering in black phosphorus
In black phosphorus, a model semiconductor, analysis of time and angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy measurements demonstrates a strong light-induced band renormalization with light polarization dependence, suggesting pseudospin-selective Floquet band engineering.
- Shaohua Zhou
- , Changhua Bao
- & Shuyun Zhou
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News & Views |
From the archive: support for Darwin, and a metallic standard
Snippets from Nature’s past.
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Article
| Open AccessA wearable cardiac ultrasound imager
Innovations in device design, material fabrication and deep learning are described, leading to a wearable ultrasound transducer capable of dynamic cardiac imaging in various environments and under different conditions.
- Hongjie Hu
- , Hao Huang
- & Sheng Xu
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Nature Video |
3D printing gets a twist from a novel nozzle
The new design can print twisting helix shapes with varying properties.
- Shamini Bundell
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Article
| Open AccessOctupole-driven magnetoresistance in an antiferromagnetic tunnel junction
The authors report observation of tunnelling magnetoresistance in an all-antiferromagnetic tunnel junction consisting of Mn3Sn/MgO/Mn3Sn, laying the foundation for the development of ultrafast and efficient spintronic devices using antiferromagnets.
- Xianzhe Chen
- , Tomoya Higo
- & Satoru Nakatsuji
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News & Views |
Broken mirror symmetry boosts current conversion in a superconductor
The intrinsic structure of a material called a chiral superconductor enhances the separation of charge carriers, transforming an electric current in a way that could change the future of memory storage at low temperatures.
- Angelo Di Bernardo
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News & Views |
Vertical architecture improves performance of transistor family
Organic electrochemical transistors could be better than conventional inorganic devices for certain uses, but have been held back by performance issues. The solution could be to build up these organic transistors like a sandwich.
- Camille Cunin
- & Aristide Gumyusenge
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Article |
In-plane charged domain walls with memristive behaviour in a ferroelectric film
The direct observation of in-plane charged domain walls in BiFeO3 ferroelectric films a few nanometres thick, their deterministic creation, manipulation and annihilation by applied voltage, as well the demonstration of their memristive functionality is reported.
- Zhongran Liu
- , Han Wang
- & He Tian
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Article |
Room-temperature magnetoresistance in an all-antiferromagnetic tunnel junction
A new exchange-bias effect between two different antiferromagnetic layers enables the fabrication of all-antiferromagnetic structures that have a large room-temperature tunnelling magnetoresistance and potential applications for ultrafast memory technologies.
- Peixin Qin
- , Han Yan
- & Zhiqi Liu
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Article |
Non-epitaxial single-crystal 2D material growth by geometric confinement
Geometric confinement on arbitrary substrates promotes, without epitaxial seeding, the layer-by-layer growth of two-dimensional single-crystal monolayers and bilayers of transition metal dichalcogenides.
- Ki Seok Kim
- , Doyoon Lee
- & Jeehwan Kim
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Article |
Rotational multimaterial printing of filaments with subvoxel control
A 3D printing platform comprising a rotational multimaterial printhead is demonstrated, enabling the fabrication of helically architected filaments and lattices with programmable subvoxel control.
- Natalie M. Larson
- , Jochen Mueller
- & Jennifer A. Lewis
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Article
| Open AccessVertical organic electrochemical transistors for complementary circuits
Vertical organic electrochemical transistors demonstrating unprecedented performances in both p- and n-type operation modes have been synthesized from new electro-active and ion-permeable semiconducting polymers by the interface engineering of electro-active blend layers.
- Wei Huang
- , Jianhua Chen
- & Antonio Facchetti
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Research Highlight |
How to make wearable devices people could forget they’re wearing
A metal–polymer composite conducts electricity and conforms to the skin, making it suitable for medical devices applied directly to the body.
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Editorial |
Don’t wait for COP: the end of the fossil-fuel age must start now
UN climate conferences are too beholden to oil and gas interests. Like-minded nations must come together to keep climate hopes alive.
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Article |
A ligand insertion mechanism for cooperative NH3 capture in metal–organic frameworks
A three-dimensional metal–organic framework reversibly binds ammonia by cooperative insertion into its metal–linker bonds to form a dense, one-dimensional coordination polymer, enabling high-capacity ammonia uptake with intrinsic thermal management.
- Benjamin E. R. Snyder
- , Ari B. Turkiewicz
- & Jeffrey R. Long
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Article |
Long-range ordered porous carbons produced from C60
A new type of carbon, long-range ordered porous carbon, is synthesized from carbon fullerenes at the gram scale and under ambient pressure.
- Fei Pan
- , Kun Ni
- & Yanwu Zhu
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Article |
Enhanced superconductivity in spin–orbit proximitized bilayer graphene
Placing monolayer tungsten diselenide on Bernal-stacked bilayer graphene promotes enhanced superconductivity, indicating that proximity-induced spin–orbit coupling plays a key role in stabilizing the pairing, paving the way for engineering tunable, ultra-clean graphene-based superconductors.
- Yiran Zhang
- , Robert Polski
- & Stevan Nadj-Perge
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News & Views |
Electric switch found for a superconductor
Ferroelectricity has been found in a superconducting compound. Strong coupling between these two properties enables ferroelectric control of the superconductivity, which could prove useful for quantum devices.
- Kenji Yasuda
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Article |
Ultrathin quantum light source with van der Waals NbOCl2 crystal
A van der Waals crystal, niobium oxide dichloride, with vanishing interlayer electronic coupling and considerable monolayer-like excitonic behaviour in the bulk, as well as strong and scalable second-order optical nonlinearity, is discovered, which enables a high-performance quantum light source.
- Qiangbing Guo
- , Xiao-Zhuo Qi
- & Andrew T. S. Wee
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Article |
Coupled ferroelectricity and superconductivity in bilayer Td-MoTe2
The authors show a hysteretic behaviour of superconductivity as a function of electric field in bilayer Td-MoTe2, representing observations of coupled ferroelectricity and superconductivity.
- Apoorv Jindal
- , Amartyajyoti Saha
- & Daniel A. Rhodes
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Article |
A few-layer covalent network of fullerenes
A two-dimensional crystalline polymer of C60, termed graphullerene, is synthesized by chemical vapour transport, and mechanically exfoliated to produce molecularly thin flakes with clean interfaces for potential optoelectronic applications.
- Elena Meirzadeh
- , Austin M. Evans
- & Xavier Roy
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Where I Work |
Me and my rhino: a relationship five million years in the making
A construction site in Tennessee that was once an ancient watering hole yields fossils that give field technician Laura Emmert clues about the rhinoceros, mastodon and other wildlife that congregated there.
- Jack Leeming
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News & Views |
Molecular engineering enables bright blue LEDs
Future LEDs could be based on lead halide perovskites. A breakthrough in preparing device-compatible solids composed of nanoscale perovskite crystals overcomes a long-standing hurdle in making blue perovskite LEDs.
- Hendrik Utzat
- & Maria Ibáñez
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Article |
Synthesis-on-substrate of quantum dot solids
Ultrasmall monodisperse perovskite quantum dots are synthesized in situ on a substrate via ligand structure regulation, yielding the highest external quantum efficiency blue perovskite LEDs reported so far.
- Yuanzhi Jiang
- , Changjiu Sun
- & Mingjian Yuan
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Review Article |
Topological kagome magnets and superconductors
Recent key developments in the exploration of kagome materials are reviewed, including fundamental concepts of a kagome lattice, realizations of Chern and Weyl topological magnetism, flat-band many-body correlations, and unconventional charge-density waves and superconductivity.
- Jia-Xin Yin
- , Biao Lian
- & M. Zahid Hasan
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Research Highlight |
Green electronics rely on materials that grow on trees
Compounds derived from eucalyptus and other plants are formulated into an ink for printing electronic components.
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Research Highlight |
Earth’s most abundant organic material provides an ion highway
Scientists manipulate cellulose, which is found in wood fibre, to produce an ion-transporting ‘supramolecule’.
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Article |
Enantioselective sensing by collective circular dichroism
An array of 2D crystals of isotropic, 432-symmetric chiral gold nanoparticles is shown to exhibit collective resonances with a strong and uniform chiral near field, allowing enantioselective detection by the collective circular dichroism.
- Ryeong Myeong Kim
- , Ji-Hyeok Huh
- & Ki Tae Nam
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Editorial |
To get serious on the circular economy, upend how global business works
Reducing our waste’s impact on the planet requires new technology and materials — and, more importantly, a complete rethink of how we incentivize the production and use of resources.
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Article |
Chiral assemblies of pinwheel superlattices on substrates
Chiroptically active pinwheel assemblies on substrates are formed by tetrahedral gold nanoparticles from the effective ‘compression’ of a perovskite-like, low-density phase, thereby enabling the manufacture of metastructured coatings with special chiroptical characteristics as identified by photon-induced near-field electron microscopy and chirality measures.
- Shan Zhou
- , Jiahui Li
- & Qian Chen
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Research Highlight |
A heat-harvesting film can also bend and bow
The film’s flexibilty, rare in ‘thermoelectric’ materials, could make it useful for powering wearable devices.
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Article |
Anomalous thermal transport under high pressure in boron arsenide
Competition between three- and four-phonon scattering processes is shown to be the source of a unique anomalous thermal conductivity in boron arsenide at high pressures.
- Suixuan Li
- , Zihao Qin
- & Yongjie Hu
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Outlook |
Video: how to make the construction industry circular
The world is running out of sand. Is circular thinking the solution?
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Outlook |
Building a circular economy
Sustainability requires conserving the planet’s resources so that waste products from one process become the input for another.
- Herb Brody
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Outlook |
Short-circuiting the electronic-waste crisis
The computers, smartphones and other technologies that define modern life are creating waste across the world. A combination of technological and policy solutions could help to limit the damage.
- Michael Eisenstein
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Outlook |
Beware the false hope of recycling
Reusing plastics and other materials is not enough. To achieving a circular economy, we must make less stuff to begin with.
- Kristian Syberg
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Outlook |
The path towards more-sustainable building construction
The built environment provides a huge opportunity to move to a circular economy. Standardization and smart design will be key to enabling the shift.
- Katharine Sanderson
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Outlook |
Recycling our way to sustainability
A circular economy requires an overhaul of product design, consumption and waste management. Although recycling is dismissed by some as insufficient, it remains an essential process.
- Sarah King
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Outlook |
How to make plastic less of an environmental burden
Plastic has long been an ecological problem. But emerging technologies and more awareness could make the ubiquitous material part of a circular economy.
- Sarah DeWeerdt
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Outlook |
How to fit clothing into the circular economy
Vast amounts of textiles end up in landfill. Technology to recycle the cellulose in fabric could make clothing more sustainable.
- Neil Savage
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Article |
Regulating surface potential maximizes voltage in all-perovskite tandems
Because open-circuit voltage deficit is greater in wide-bandgap perovskite solar cells, the authors introduce diammonium molecules to modify perovskite surface states and achieve a more uniform spatial distribution of surface potential, enabling record voltage all-perovskite tandem solar cells.
- Hao Chen
- , Aidan Maxwell
- & Edward H. Sargent
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News & Views |
A molecular flip-flop for separating heavy water
Molecules of heavy water contain the deuterium isotope of hydrogen and have been impossible to separate from ordinary water. Nanoporous materials with flexible apertures in their structures point the way to a solution.
- Thomas Heine
- & Randall Q. Snurr
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Research Briefing |
Bright, efficient and stable LEDs made using nanocrystals of perovskite material
Perovskites are promising candidates for use in next-generation light-emitting diode (LED) displays that are vivid and have high colour quality. LEDs made from particles with a perovskite nanocrystal core and an acidic shell are efficient and bright, and have a long operational half-life.
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Research Briefing |
Rational discovery of solid materials by tuning a hot two-part solution
High-temperature solutions called fluxes are widely used to synthesize solid compounds. The composition and structural properties of reaction products in a two-component flux system can now be tuned by varying the temperature and the ratio between a component of the reaction medium and a second component that serves as a ‘tuning knob’.
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Article |
Perovskite solar cells based on screen-printed thin films
Using a stable and viscosity-tunable perovskite ink, a hybrid perovskite thin-film photovoltaic device can be deposited by the screen-printing method, which exhibits higher efficiency compared with previously investigated techniques.
- Changshun Chen
- , Jianxin Chen
- & Wei Huang