Materials science articles within Nature Communications

Featured

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Hydrogen spillover is well-documented in hydrogenation catalysis, but its existence through metalorganic frameworks (MOFs) remains controversial. Here, the authors provide evidence of the occurrence of hydrogen spillover in microporous MOFs at elevated temperatures, and measure quantitatively the penetration depths of atomic hydrogen.

    • Guowu Zhan
    •  & Hua Chun Zeng

  • Article
    | Open Access

    No substances with greater degrees of degeneracy than spherical atoms are known, due to geometrical limitations. In this work the authors combine density functional theory and tight-binding models to predict metal clusters with higher-fold degeneracies than spherical atoms, which are ascribed to dynamical symmetry.

    • Naoki Haruta
    • , Takamasa Tsukamoto
    •  & Kimihisa Yamamoto

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Materials which change shape in response to a trigger are of interest for soft robotics and targeted therapeutic delivery. Here, the authors report on the development of DNA-crosslinked hydrogels which can expand upon the detection of different biomolecular inputs mediated by DNA strand-displacement.

    • Joshua Fern
    •  & Rebecca Schulman

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Chemically functionalized graphene oxide-based pn junction diodes have potential for future electronic device applications. Here, the authors report an all carbon pn diode with graphene oxide and carbon nanotubes electrodes showing excellent current rectification and efficient logic gates.

    • Xiaojing Feng
    • , Xing Zhao
    •  & Yong Yan

  • Article
    | Open Access

    High-order correlated states in atomically thin transition metal dichalcogenides may be facilitated by long-lived optically dark excitons. Here, the authors report experimentally the emergence of neutral and charged biexciton species at low light intensities in encapsulated WSe2 monolayers.

    • Ziliang Ye
    • , Lutz Waldecker
    •  & Tony F. Heinz

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Multi-exciton states may emerge in atomically thin transition metal dichalcogenides as a result of strong many-body interactions. Here, the authors report experimental evidence of four- and five-particle biexciton complexes in monolayer WSe2 and their electrical control.

    • Matteo Barbone
    • , Alejandro R.-P. Montblanch
    •  & Mete Atatüre

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Owing to strong Coulomb interactions, atomically thin transition metal dichalcogenides host strongly bound excitonic complexes. Here, the authors report charge-neutral biexciton and negatively charged trion-exciton complexes in hBN encapsulated monolayer WSe2 by employing low-temperature photoluminescence spectroscopy.

    • Zhipeng Li
    • , Tianmeng Wang
    •  & Su-Fei Shi

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The availability of surface oxygen vacancies or electrons is often viewed as the defining factor for the reactivity of perovskite oxides. Two precisely controlled surfaces on SrTiO3(110) show strikingly different O exchange kinetics, which the authors ascribe to the flexibility of the surface polyhedra.

    • Michele Riva
    • , Markus Kubicek
    •  & Ulrike Diebold

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The consequences of electron-electron interactions are difficult to calculate reliably but this is needed to understand important physical properties such as ferromagnetism. Tusche et al. show that interaction effects in cobalt are nonlocal, presenting a challenge to future theoretical approaches.

    • Christian Tusche
    • , Martin Ellguth
    •  & Jürgen Kirschner

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Aluminum-air batteries are lightweight and cost effective, but performance is limited by corrosion and solid by-products. Here the authors catalyze oxygen reduction with silver manganate nanoplates and develop an aluminum-air flow battery that delivers high energy density and alleviates side reactions.

    • Jaechan Ryu
    • , Haeseong Jang
    •  & Jaephil Cho

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Spatially controlled expansion and contraction of soft tissues to achieve complex three dimensional morphologies remains challenging in man-made materials. Here the authors demonstrate encoding of 2D hydrogels with spatially and temporally controlled growth to create dynamic 3D structures.

    • Amirali Nojoomi
    • , Hakan Arslan
    •  & Kyungsuk Yum

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Bubbles tend to burst and retract into droplets. Here the authors show how a droplet can be turned into a bubble by levitating the droplets acoustically and exploiting their buckling to form gas bubbles.

    • Duyang Zang
    • , Lin Li
    •  & Xingguo Geng

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Phase separation of mixtures of oppositely charged polymers provides a simple and direct route to compartmentalisation via coacervation. Here authors demonstrate that a coacervate microenvironment supports RNA catalysis whilst selectively sequestering RNA based on length.

    • Björn Drobot
    • , Juan M. Iglesias-Artola
    •  & T-Y Dora Tang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Multi-compartmentalised soft micro-systems are used as models of synthetic protocells. Here, the authors developed nested host–guest protocell constructs capable of self-reconfiguration in response to changes in pH generated by antagonistic modes of enzyme-mediated coupling.

    • Nicolas Martin
    • , Jean-Paul Douliez
    •  & Stephen Mann

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The separation of high molecular weight polymers composed of the same number of monomeric units remains highly challenging. Here, the authors show that efficient separation and purification of mixtures of polymers that differ only by their terminal groups can be achieved through polymer threading in metal-organic framework channels.

    • Benjamin Le Ouay
    • , Chikara Watanabe
    •  & Takashi Uemura

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The ability to stabilise colloidal suspensions in solution against salt-induced aggregation is critical to many industrial applications, but it remains challenging at high salt concentration. To overcome this problem, Lan et al. introduce a raspberry-like colloidal particle with controllable morphology.

    • Yang Lan
    • , Alessio Caciagli
    •  & Erika Eiser

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Trapping air at the solid-liquid interface is a promising strategy for reducing frictional drag but could not be realized without perfluorinated coatings so-far. Here the authors demonstrate a biomimetic coating-free approach for entrapping air for long periods upon immersion in liquids.

    • Eddy M. Domingues
    • , Sankara Arunachalam
    •  & Himanshu Mishra

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Two-dimensional piezoelectric materials hold promise for nano-electromechanical technologies, yet it is challenging to prepare them in large areas with high sample homogeneity. Syed et al. surface print GaPO4 sheets with unit cell thickness over centimetres using a liquid metal-based synthesis process.

    • Nitu Syed
    • , Ali Zavabeti
    •  & Kourosh Kalantar-Zadeh

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Controlling the composition and crystal phase of layered heterostructures is important. Here, the authors report the liquid-phase epitaxial growth of Sn0.5W0.5S2 nanosheets with 83% metallic phase on SnS2 nanoplates, which are used as 100 ppb level chemiresistive gas sensors at room temperature.

    • Xiaoshan Wang
    • , Zhiwei Wang
    •  & Wei Huang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The deformation of soft materials under high rates remains challenging to be probed directly and thus understood. Huerre et al. examine the self-assembly of colloids confined at a fluid interface driven by ultrasound and show the formation of string-like microstructures caused by dynamic capillarity.

    • Axel Huerre
    • , Marco De Corato
    •  & Valeria Garbin

  • Article
    | Open Access

    All materials subjected to mechanical deformation form low energy interfaces known as twin boundaries. Here, the authors investigate a variety of structural features that form upon bending atomically thin 2D-crystals, and predict distinct classes of post deformation microstructure based on their atomic arrangement, bend angle and flake thickness.

    • A. P. Rooney
    • , Z. Li
    •  & S. J. Haigh

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Observing the Peltier effect, e.g. cooling/heating at material junctions due to current flow, in organic thermoelectric films remains a challenge due the inherent properties of these materials. Here, the authors use IR imaging to experimentally observe the Peltier effect in poly(Ni-ett)-based films.

    • Wenlong Jin
    • , Liyao Liu
    •  & Daoben Zhu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    High-performance stretchable conductive fibers are desired for the development of stretchable electronic devices but preparation of conductive hydrogel fibers is challenging. Inspired by spider silk the authors demonstrate here a spinning method to prepare stretchable conductive hydrogel fibers with ordered polymer chain alignment.

    • Xue Zhao
    • , Fang Chen
    •  & Mingming Ma

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Atomic force microscopy is an indispensable method in characterizing soft materials but the complexity of biological samples makes reproducible measurements difficult. Here the authors use a 3-step method to investigate biological specimens in which vertical and lateral heterogeneity hinders a precise quantitative characterization.

    • Massimiliano Galluzzi
    • , Guanlin Tang
    •  & Florian J. Stadler

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A possible route to producing processable soft materials is by assembling metal organic cubes into hydrogels. Here the authors show charge-assisted H-bond driven self-assembly of Ga3+-based anionic metal organic cubes and suitable molecular binders towards multi-functional hydrogels.

    • Papri Sutar
    • , Venkata M. Suresh
    •  & Tapas Kumar Maji

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Static pressures exceeding 4 million atmospheres are extremely challenging to achieve, but are necessary for the study of matter that exists under these conditions in natural environments. Here, diamonds anvils with a toroidal design are demonstrated to sustain over 6 million atmospheres in a diamond anvil cell.

    • Zs. Jenei
    • , E. F. O’Bannon
    •  & W. J. Evans

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Room-temperature spin-generation in 1D systems like semiconductor nanopillars is typically inefficient. Here, the authors demonstrate an approach to achieve efficient spin polarization, even in the absence of a magnetic field, by selectively enhancing the radiative efficiency of one spin direction.

    • Shula Chen
    • , Yuqing Huang
    •  & Weimin M. Chen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Anharmonic ultrafast structural dynamics are expected in lead halide perovskites due to their soft nature. Here Rivett et al. show that these dynamics lead to picosecond-long polarization anisotropy of photo-carriers in several halide perovskites, orders of magnitude slower than in conventional semiconductors.

    • Jasmine P. H. Rivett
    • , Liang Z. Tan
    •  & Felix Deschler

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The defining quantities of topological materials—the topological invariants—are often difficult to calculate. Here, Song et al. report a simplified method to calculate both the symmetry data and the topological invariants for arbitrary gapped band structure with time-reversal symmetry.

    • Zhida Song
    • , Tiantian Zhang
    •  & Chen Fang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Perovskite light-emitting diodes show promising color tunability and device performance but suffer from emission color shift at higher driving voltages. Here Xing et al. report color stable blue light-emitting diodes by drastically increasing the phase purity of the quasi-2D perovskite thin films.

    • Jun Xing
    • , Yongbiao Zhao
    •  & Edward H. Sargent

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Control over mechanochemical polymer scission by external stimuli may offer an avenue to further advance the fields of polymer chemistry, mechanochemistry, and materials science. Here the authors show light regulating the mechanochemical behavior of a diarylethene-conjugated Diels–Alder adduct.

    • Jumpei Kida
    • , Keiichi Imato
    •  & Hideyuki Otsuka

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Water uptake of natural polymers is accompanied by swelling and changes in the internal structure of the polymeric system but the exact mechanism of water-uptake and swelling remained unknown. Here the authors use atom-scale simulations to identify a molecular mechanism which is responsible for hysteresis in sorption-induced swelling in natural polymers.

    • Mingyang Chen
    • , Benoit Coasne
    •  & Jan Carmeliet

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The existence of a crystalline precursor is key to perovskite film formation, but the precise chemistry of the precursor and its transformation into perovskite are poorly understood. Here, the authors identify the crystal structure and conversion chemistry of the precursor for PbCl2-derived methylammonium lead iodide perovskites.

    • Kevin H. Stone
    • , Aryeh Gold-Parker
    •  & Christopher J. Tassone

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Quasicrystals possess long range order but no translational symmetry, and rotational symmetries that are forbidden in periodic crystals. Here, a fullerene overlayer deposited on a surface of an icosahedral intermetallic quasicrystal achieves a Fibonacci square grid structure, by selective adsorption at specific sites.

    • Sam Coates
    • , Joseph A. Smerdon
    •  & Hem Raj Sharma

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The structural changes at low-coordination sites of nanocatalysts such as edges, remain poorly understood. Here, the authors report observations of high-lattice distortion at edges of Pt nanocrystals during heterogeneous catalytic methane oxidation by using in situ 3D Bragg coherent X-ray diffraction imaging.

    • Dongjin Kim
    • , Myungwoo Chung
    •  & Hyunjung Kim

  • Article
    | Open Access

    High entropy oxides provide a new strategy toward materials design by stabilizing single-phase crystal structures composed of multiple cations. Here, the authors apply this concept to the development of conversion-type electrode materials for lithium-ion storage and show the underlying mechanism.

    • Abhishek Sarkar
    • , Leonardo Velasco
    •  & Ben Breitung

  • Article
    | Open Access

    3D printing of titanium alloys today is based on known alloy compositions that result in anisotropic structural properties. Here, the authors add lanthanum to commercially pure titanium and exploit a solidification path that reduces texture and anisotropy.

    • Pere Barriobero-Vila
    • , Joachim Gussone
    •  & Guillermo Requena

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Carrier multiplication processes based on new electron-hole pair generation is instrumental to realizing ultrafast and efficient optoelectronic devices. Here, the authors demonstrate multilayered black phosphorous-based transistors that show enhanced performance due to carrier multiplication.

    • Faisal Ahmed
    • , Young Duck Kim
    •  & Won Jong Yoo

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Angle-resolved monitoring of structure parameters during crystal growth is often slow owing to mechanical movements. Here, the authors use second harmonic scattering and Fourier-plane imaging to dynamically monitor size, shape and concentration of ZIF-8 in situ during the growth process.

    • Stijn Van Cleuvenbergen
    • , Zachary J. Smith
    •  & Monique A. van der Veen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Existing thermal technologies are mainly designed to harvest heat at high temperature, whilst low-grade heat is hardly utilized to date. Here, Wang et al. show an interlocked thermo-mechano feedback mechanism that transfers ambient heat to multimodal locomotions, potentially for soft robotics applications.

    • Xiao-Qiao Wang
    • , Chuan Fu Tan
    •  & Ghim Wei Ho

  • Article
    | Open Access

    There is interest in the development of mussel inspired materials; however, this requires an understanding of the materials. Here, the authors report on an investigation into the properties of mussel cuticle from different species that challenges conventional wisdom about particle filled composites.

    • Christophe A. Monnier
    • , Daniel G. DeMartini
    •  & J. Herbert Waite

Browse broader subjects

Browse narrower subjects

Browse Materials science across other nature.com journals