Nanoscience and technology articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    The free-volume of a polymer is a key parameter in its ability to permit through transport of small molecules. Here, the authors develop a way of introducing different degrees of artificial free-volume to a polymer membrane, and thus tailor its penetrability for applications including biofuel purification.

    • Nikos Petzetakis
    • , Cara M. Doherty
    •  & Nitash P. Balsara

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Nanoscale patterning methods based on self-assembly promise to revolutionize the fabrication of high-tech devices, but suffer from a limited number of possible lattice symmetries. Here, the authors use a laser zone annealing technique to pattern block copolymers into any 2D mesh motif they desire.

    • Pawel W. Majewski
    • , Atikur Rahman
    •  & Kevin G. Yager

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Metasurfaces are arrays of subwavelength structures that are tailored to produce specific optical responses. Rozin et al.show that large-area metasurfaces can be readily fabricated by self-assembly of colloidal nanocrystals of different geometries, producing tunable reflectance and absorbance properties.

    • Matthew J. Rozin
    • , David A. Rosen
    •  & Andrea R. Tao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The properties of 2D materials such as graphene can vary according to the quality and, for vertical devices, the interfaces between materials. Here, the authors report a method using TOF-SIMS, micro-Raman spectroscopy and atomic force microscopy to give high levels of detail of vertical 2D heterostructures.

    • Harry Chou
    • , Ariel Ismach
    •  & Andrei Dolocan

  • Article |

    Graphene forms low-resistance tunnel barriers for spin injection from a ferromagnet into silicon. Here, the authors fabricate silicon nanowire non-local spin valves with graphene tunnel barriers, evidencing spin accumulation and transport via Hanle spin precession measurements.

    • O. M. J. van ’t Erve
    • , A. L. Friedman
    •  & B. T. Jonker

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Creating the motion of nanosized or microsized objects is essential for building robots at small scales. Here, Uchida et al.move photoresponsive organic crystals on a glass substrate using two lamps, which crystallize and melt the crystal front and the rear, respectively, to generate the moving force.

    • Emi Uchida
    • , Reiko Azumi
    •  & Yasuo Norikane

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Smart shape-memory polymers based on pressure stimuli have potential biomedical and aerospace applications but are largely unexplored. Here, Fang et al.present a reconfigurable photonic crystal that is reprogrammed at ambient conditions by a pressure-responsive shape-memory polymer.

    • Yin Fang
    • , Yongliang Ni
    •  & Peng Jiang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Direct coupling between chemical groups on individual nanostructures may lead to new architectures and reactions. Here, the authors report an ambient mechano-chemical reaction between two different reactant carbon nanotube varieties, which produces condensation products and unzipping of the nanotube structure.

    • Mohamad A. Kabbani
    • , Chandra Sekhar Tiwary
    •  & Pulickel M. Ajayan

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The contribution from water bridges at nanoscale between rough surfaces is important for macroscopic friction under ambient conditions. Here, Lee et al. show that water nanobridge produce noncontact friction originated from the pinning–depinning dynamics of the contact line at the interface.

    • Manhee Lee
    • , Bongsu Kim
    •  & Wonho Jhe

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Nanowires and nanotubes are ideal candidates for energy applications but inorganic multielement oxides are less well studied. Here, the authors propose a gradient-electrospinning followed by controlled-pyrolysis method to synthesize various controllable one dimensional metal oxide nanostructures.

    • Chaojiang Niu
    • , Jiashen Meng
    •  & Liqiang Mai

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Plasmonic nanostructures are a promising alternative to conventional pixels, where their characteristics at the nanoscale offer many benefits. Franklin et al. combine plasmonic surfaces with liquid crystals to create voltage-tunable polarization-independent color pixels for reflective displays.

    • Daniel Franklin
    • , Yuan Chen
    •  & Debashis Chanda

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The lowering of polymer viscosity upon addition of small amounts of nanoparticles is counter-intuitive and has puzzled researchers. Here, Mangal et al. explain this intriguing phenomenon using a model polymer–nanocomposite system comprised of well-dispersed nanoparticles in an entangled polymer melt.

    • Rahul Mangal
    • , Samanvaya Srivastava
    •  & Lynden A. Archer

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Although screw dislocations impact on the properties of various engineering materials, their investigation on the atomic scale has been challenging. Here, the authors use optical sectioning in a scanning transmission electron microscope to achieve direct imaging of screw displacements around a screw dislocation core in GaN.

    • H. Yang
    • , J. G. Lozano
    •  & P. D. Nellist

  • Article
    | Open Access

    High-resolution microscopy allows imaging of information on the atomic scale. Here, by combining precession electron diffraction with scanning transmission electron microscopy, the authors demonstrate an efficient, alternative technique to determine the three-dimensional orientation of materials.

    • Alexander S. Eggeman
    • , Robert Krakow
    •  & Paul A. Midgley

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Heteroatom doping of graphitic networks has been shown to modify electrocatalytic performance. Here, the authors fabricate semimetal antimony doped graphene nanoplatelet based catalysts and demonstrate their enhanced stability for oxygen reduction, due to the multiple accessible antimony oxidation states.

    • In-Yup Jeon
    • , Min Choi
    •  & Jong-Beom Baek

  • Article |

    Existing lithographic methods for the micropatterning of reduced graphene oxide (rGO) are limited by mask production. Here, the authors fabricate fully 3D rGO microstructures in an aqueous nematic liquid crystal of two-dimensional GO flakes via a scalable, mask-free pulsed near-infrared laser approach.

    • Bohdan Senyuk
    • , Natnael Behabtu
    •  & Ivan I. Smalyukh

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Understanding the nature of coherent absorption is essential for exploiting it in new technologies. Here, the authors show that a metamaterial can deterministically absorb photons from a travelling wave with nearly unitary probability, down to the single-photon level.

    • Thomas Roger
    • , Stefano Vezzoli
    •  & Daniele Faccio

  • Article
    | Open Access

    STED nanoscopy enables sub-diffraction imaging with a wide range of fluorescent probes. Here, the authors show that a bright and very photostable class of fluorescent quantum dots can be super-resolved with STED as biolabels in cellular contexts.

    • Janina Hanne
    • , Henning J. Falk
    •  & Stefan W. Hell

  • Article |

    Radio-frequency circuits offer fast low-noise detection of signals in carbon nanotubes, but incompatibilities in fabrication degrade the performance of the hybrid device. Here, the authors use a deterministic mechanical transfer to couple pristine nanotubes to a gigahertz superconducting matching circuit.

    • V. Ranjan
    • , G. Puebla-Hellmann
    •  & C. Schönenberger

  • Article |

    Carbon nanotubes have been proposed for many forms of water treatment, although ultrafiltration nanotube-based membranes with very high flow rates remain rare. Here, the authors fabricate a membrane delivering water permeability close to 30,000 litres per square meter per hour at 1 bar.

    • Byeongho Lee
    • , Youngbin Baek
    •  & Yong Hyup Kim

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Deformable and high-resolution LEDs have attracted great interest for wearable electronics, but full-colour display is still challenging. Using a stamp printing technology, Choi et al. build ultra-thin RGB quantum dot pixel arrays with luminous efficiency of 14,000 cd m−2operated at low voltage of 7 V.

    • Moon Kee Choi
    • , Jiwoong Yang
    •  & Dae-Hyeong Kim

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Nanomechanical resonators are sensitive to tiny changes in their mass. Here, the authors demonstrate a method for quickly measuring many resonator modes and use it to analyse the mass and position of multiple nanoparticles flowing in a fluid channel with a precision of 40 attograms and 150 nm, respectively.

    • Selim Olcum
    • , Nathan Cermak
    •  & Scott R. Manalis

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Two-dimensional sheets of zeolites can function as molecular sieves for applications such as membranes or as catalysts. Here, the authors demonstrate a method using electron diffraction patterns to accurately measure the thickness and wrinkles of thin zeolite nanosheets.

    • Prashant Kumar
    • , Kumar Varoon Agrawal
    •  & K. Andre Mkhoyan

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The transfer of chirality from surfaces to molecular species may have implications in areas from the origin of homochirality to heterogeneous catalysis. Here, the authors show that a chiral gold cluster can transfer its inherent chirality to adsorbed, achiral molecules, causing them to adopt chiral conformations.

    • Igor Dolamic
    • , Birte Varnholt
    •  & Thomas Bürgi

  • Article
    | Open Access

    By incorporating magnetic materials into periodic nanostructures, additional control over the magneto-optical response of the system can be introduced. Kataja et al. show that arrays of magnetic nanoparticles exhibit Fano-type surface plasmon resonances with cross-coupling tuned by the lattice symmetry.

    • M. Kataja
    • , T. K. Hakala
    •  & P. Törmä

  • Article |

    Graphene’s exotic properties make it suitable for many different optoelectronic devices. Brar et al. show that graphene plasmonic resonators can be exploited to produce narrow spectral emission in the mid-infrared, whose frequency and intensity can be modulated by electrostatic gating.

    • Victor W. Brar
    • , Michelle C. Sherrott
    •  & Harry A. Atwater

  • Article |

    The mechanical properties of metal nanostructures depend on nature of the adhesion layer attaching it to a substrate. Chang et al.find that the properties of phonons in gold nanodisks vary with adhesion layer thickness, and that this response can act as a probe of the metallic composition of the disk.

    • Wei-Shun Chang
    • , Fangfang Wen
    •  & Stephan Link

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Microelectromechanical systems (MEMS) are essential in a wide range of photonics applications but have not been demonstrated for X-ray optics. Here, Mukhopadhyay et al.use single-crystal silicon to demonstrate a MEMS system that can preserve and manipulate the spatial, temporal and spectral correlations of the X-rays.

    • D. Mukhopadhyay
    • , D. A. Walko
    •  & G. K. Shenoy

  • Article |

    Miniaturization of optical structures allows light control in the nanoscale, but handling a large-scale device with aperiodic and random nanostructures is challenging. Here, Huang et al.design and fabricate a non-periodic photon sieve with control over amplitude, phase and polarization in visible light.

    • Kun Huang
    • , Hong Liu
    •  & Cheng-Wei Qiu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A weak and narrow electric dipole has limited the use of silicon nanospheres in nanophotonic applications requiring strong interaction between electric and magnetic modes. Here, Yan et al.demonstrate effective coupling between the magnetic resonance and the electric gap mode in nearly touching silicon nanospheres.

    • J. H. Yan
    • , P. Liu
    •  & G. W. Yang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The self-assembly of anisotropic nanoparticles into large-area superlattices remains challenging. Here the authors exploit surface chemistry to tune the wettability of silver nano-octahedra, and direct a continuous superlattice structural evolution, from close-packed to progressively open structures.

    • Yih Hong Lee
    • , Wenxiong Shi
    •  & Xing Yi Ling

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Metamaterials can be engineered to provide electric and magnetic responses that cannot be achieved in natural media. Here, the authors present a metamaterial based on plasmonic chevron nanowires that it exhibits a large reciprocal magneto-electro-optical effect driven by the Lorentz force.

    • João Valente
    • , Jun-Yu Ou
    •  & Nikolay I. Zheludev

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Morphological characterization of organic photovoltaic active layers is restricted by the lack of accurate chemical mapping tools. Here, the authors demonstrate an energy-filtered scanning electron microscopy technique, which enables sub-nanometre resolution imaging of an organic photovoltaic blend.

    • Robert C. Masters
    • , Andrew J. Pearson
    •  & Cornelia Rodenburg

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Mass spectral analysis is used to map the composition of materials and surfaces in numerous fields. Here, the authors report a mass spectral technique based on extreme ultraviolet laser ablation that allows three-dimensional imaging of chemical composition in addition to giving highly sensitive nanoscale resolution.

    • Ilya Kuznetsov
    • , Jorge Filevich
    •  & Carmen S. Menoni

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Controlling self-assembly of nanoparticles into superlattices is an important approach to build functional materials. Here, Lu et al. use directional binding provided by DNA-encoded polyhedral blocks—cubes or octahedrons—to guide spherical nanoparticles into clusters and three-dimensional lattices.

    • Fang Lu
    • , Kevin G. Yager
    •  & Oleg Gang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The nanoscale manipulation of the shape and composition of metallic glasses is challenging. Here, the authors employ a multitarget carousel oblique angle deposition strategy to synthesize metallic glass nanoarchitectures, and demonstrate applicability to a range of glass-forming alloys.

    • Yanhui Liu
    • , Jingbei Liu
    •  & Jan Schroers

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Shale gas and oil are trapped in nanoscale porous networks of ultra-low permeability. Here, the authors develop a molecular model of alkane transport through nanoporous materials, showing that the mechanisms controlling flow at the nanoscale lead to a simple scaling of permeance with hydrocarbon size and density.

    • Kerstin Falk
    • , Benoit Coasne
    •  & Lydéric Bocquet

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