Physical sciences articles within Nature Materials

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  • Article |

    By combining nano-spot angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy and atomic force microscopy, the authors resolve the fine electronic structure of the flat band and remote bands of twisted bilayer graphene as the twist angle varies, revealing a spectral weight transfer between remote bands that is attributed to lattice relaxations.

    • Qian Li
    • , Hongyun Zhang
    •  & Shuyun Zhou

  • Article |

    Combining resonant inelastic X-ray scattering and photoluminescence spectroscopy, an elementary excitation in hexagonal-boron-nitride-based single-photon emitters has been demonstrated, giving rise to multiple regular harmonics that can explain the wide frequency range of these emitters.

    • Jonathan Pelliciari
    • , Enrique Mejia
    •  & Gabriele Grosso

  • Article |

    The turn-off time is generally faster than the turn-on time in accumulation mode organic electrochemical transistors (OECTs), but the mechanism is less understood. Here the authors find different transient behaviours of turn-on and turn-off in accumulation mode OECTs, and ion transport is the limiting factor of device kinetics.

    • Jiajie Guo
    • , Shinya E. Chen
    •  & David S. Ginger

  • Article |

    Ion exchange is a powerful method to access metastable materials for energy storage, but identifying lithium and sodium interchange in layered oxides remains challenging. Using such model materials, vacancy level and corresponding lithium preference are shown to be crucial for ion exchange pathway accessibility.

    • Yu Han
    • , Weihang Xie
    •  & Chong Liu

  • Article |

    The authors report coexisting ferromagnetism, polar distortion and metallicity in quasi-two-dimensional Ca3Co3O8, providing a platform to exploit magnetoelectric coupling in a metallic system.

    • Jianbing Zhang
    • , Shengchun Shen
    •  & Pu Yu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Harnessing premature necking produces a rapid multiplication of dislocations to interact with local chemical orders for work hardening in VCoNi alloy, achieving ductility of 20% and yield strength of 2 GPa during room-temperature and cryogenic deformation.

    • Bowen Xu
    • , Huichao Duan
    •  & Xiaolei Wu

  • Research Briefing |

    Soft pressure sensors drift under prolonged high stress because of the creep of soft materials, which causes inaccurate measurements. Now, through molecular-level design, a leakage-free and creep-free polyelectrolyte elastomer is synthesized, and an iontronic sensor using the polyelectrolyte elastomer shows very low signal drift under a high static pressure.

  • News & Views |

    Light-driven artificial goosebumps enable the simple yet precise actuation of microstructures.

    • Jaeil Kim
    •  & Hoon Eui Jeong

  • News & Views |

    Highly efficient matrix-free hyperfluorescent organic light-emitting diodes are constructed with remarkably supressed Dexter transfer utilizing narrowband blue emitters encapsulated with hopped alkyl chains.

    • Yuewei Zhang
    •  & Lian Duan

  • News & Views |

    Pentagonal polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane (POSS)-based giant atoms self-assemble into Frank–Kasper phases that have not been previously observed in soft-matter systems.

    • Pengyu Chen
    •  & Kevin D. Dorfman

  • News & Views |

    Better control over the quality of materials dissipates doubts about charge order in infinite-layer nickelates and indicates that a previously observed superstructure is probably a spurious effect related to other crystalline phases. This finding strengthens the similarities between nickelates and cuprates.

    • Giacomo Ghiringhelli

  • Review Article |

    Non-layered transition metal carbides (TMCs) and layered transition metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) can form various heterostructure configurations through chemical conversion. This Review highlights the progress in the fabrication and control of TMC/TMD heterostructures and the exotic properties arising from these interfaces.

    • Alexander J. Sredenschek
    • , David Emanuel Sanchez
    •  & Mauricio Terrones

  • Perspective |

    Molecular materials for computing progress intensively but the performance and reliability still lag behind. Here the authors assess the current state of computing with molecular-based materials and describe two issues as the basis of a new computing technology: continued exploration of molecular electronic properties and process development for on-chip integration.

    • R. Stanley Williams
    • , Sreebrata Goswami
    •  & Sreetosh Goswami

  • News & Views |

    Noble gas atoms sandwiched in bilayer graphene are directly visualized with scanning transmission electron microscopy, revealing solid and liquid-like dynamics of two-dimensional cluster structures at room temperature under encapsulation.

    • Tao Xu
    •  & Litao Sun

  • Article |

    Lack of local phase patterning in liquid crystal elastomers has hindered their broad implementation. The authors report a laser-induced dynamic crosslinking approach with allyl sulfide groups to achieve reconfigurable high-resolution patterning of multiple liquid crystalline phases in a single film.

    • Seok Hwan Choi
    • , Ju Hee Kim
    •  & Seung Hwan Ko

  • Research Briefing |

    Electrocaloric effects have not hitherto been experimentally studied at a phase transition created by strain. It is now shown that the continuous transition created by epitaxial strain in strontium titanate films greatly enhances electrocaloric effects over a wide range of temperatures, including room temperature.

  • Article |

    Pre-intercalation with alkali-metal ions is attractive for accessing higher reversible capacity and improved rate performance in Li-ion batteries. Topochemical single-crystal transformations in a tunnel-structured positive electrode are used to clarify the effect of pre-intercalation in modifying the host lattice and altering diffusion pathways.

    • Yuting Luo
    • , Joseph V. Handy
    •  & Sarbajit Banerjee

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Electrocaloric effects are large in a limited set of materials that display hysteretic first-order phase transitions. Here epitaxial SrTiO3 thin films are strain engineered to achieve anhysteretic second-order phase transitions, with electrocaloric effects enhanced by one order of magnitude over bulk.

    • S. Zhang
    • , J. Deliyore-Ramírez
    •  & N. D. Mathur

  • Article |

    Conventional iontronic pressure sensors suffer from signal drift and inaccuracy owing to creep of soft materials and ion leakage. Here the authors report a leakage-free and creep-free polyelectrolyte-elastomer-based iontronic sensor that achieves a drift rate two to three orders of magnitude lower than those of conventional iontronic sensors.

    • Yunfeng He
    • , Yu Cheng
    •  & Chuan Fei Guo

  • Research Briefing |

    Single-crystal black phosphorus nanoribbons have been grown through chemical vapour transport, using black phosphorus nanoparticles as seeds. The nanoribbons orient exclusively along the zigzag direction and have good semiconductor properties that render them suitable for use as channel material in field-effect transistors.

  • Article |

    Limited datasets hinder the accurate prediction of DNA origami structures. A data-driven and physics-informed approach for model training is presented using a graph neural network to facilitate the rapid virtual prototyping of DNA-based nanostructures.

    • Chien Truong-Quoc
    • , Jae Young Lee
    •  & Do-Nyun Kim

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Suppressed Dexter transfer is needed to achieve efficient and stable hyperfluorescence, but complex matrices must be involved. A molecular design strategy has been proposed where Dexter transfer can be substantially reduced by an encapsulated terminal emitter, leading to ‘matrix-free’ hyperfluorescence.

    • Hwan-Hee Cho
    • , Daniel G. Congrave
    •  & Hugo Bronstein

  • News & Views |

    Restricting the directional segregation of mobile ions via strategic local ion confinement allows remarkable thermoelectric performance with better stability.

    • Animesh Bhui
    •  & Kanishka Biswas

  • Article |

    Cu2Se is of interest for thermoelectrics as it is environmentally sustainable and has a high figure of merit ZT; however, copper ion migration impacts device stability. Here a co-doping strategy that combines steric and electrostatic effects is shown to improve device stability as well as improving ZT to 3.

    • Haihua Hu
    • , Yiwei Ju
    •  & Jing-Feng Li

  • Article |

    An intelligent DNA nanodevice, composed of DNA origami nanosheets and a thrombin-responsive DNA fastener, accurately delivers the appropriate dose of tissue plasminogen activator following activation by distinct thrombosis events.

    • Jue Yin
    • , Siyu Wang
    •  & Lianhui Wang

  • News & Views |

    The atomic reconstruction and stacking arrangement in twisted trilayer graphene with a range of varying twist angles are elucidated by four-dimensional scanning transmission electron microscopy, revealing the hierarchical moiré of moiré superstructures that govern the structural symmetry at different length scales.

    • Ruichun Luo
    •  & Wu Zhou

  • News & Views |

    Cancer cells adjust the composition of their glycocalyx to increase its thickness and create a physical barrier that shields them from immune recognition and engagement.

    • Edward N. Schmidt
    •  & Matthew S. Macauley

  • Article
    | Open Access

    An orbitally ordered state in Bi2Sr2CaCu2O8+x is revealed, which splits the energy levels of oxygen orbitals by ~50 meV.

    • Shuqiu Wang
    • , Niall Kennedy
    •  & Shane M. O’Mahony

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Oxygen redox cathodes deliver higher energy densities than those based on transition metal redox but commonly exhibit voltage fade on extended cycling. The loss of O-redox capacity and voltage fade is shown to arise from a reduction in O2−/O2 redox process reversibility and O2 loss.

    • John-Joseph Marie
    • , Robert A. House
    •  & Peter G. Bruce

  • Article |

    A universal and non-destructive technique is developed to process diverse types of powder into micro- or nanofibres, providing flexibility for material design and applications based on functional particles.

    • Hanwei Wang
    • , Cheng Zeng
    •  & Huiqiao Li

  • Article |

    Single-crystal black phosphorus nanoribbons are grown uniformly on insulating substrates by chemical vapour transport growth with black phosphorus nanoparticles as seeds, demonstrating potential for application in nanoelectronic devices and the exploration of the exotic physics in black phosphorus.

    • Hongya Wang
    • , Yichen Song
    •  & Yuanbo Zhang

  • Article |

    Solvation dynamics at picosecond timescales critically affect charge transport in aqueous systems, but conflicting values have been reported for organic electrolytes. Lifetimes on the order of 1 ns for mixtures of organic polymer and lithium salt exhibiting ultraslow dynamics of solvation shell break-up are now reported.

    • Neel J. Shah
    • , Chao Fang
    •  & Nitash P. Balsara

  • Article |

    Fast charging is driving extensive research on enhanced electrodes for high-performance electrochemical capacitors and micro-supercapacitors. Thick ruthenium nitride pseudocapacitive films are shown to exhibit enhanced capacitance with a time constant of less than 6 s.

    • Huy Dinh Khac
    • , Grace Whang
    •  & Christophe Lethien

  • Article |

    Controlling substrate elasticity during physical vapour deposition allows access to high-density stable glasses that would otherwise be formed under prohibitively slow deposition conditions on rigid substrates.

    • Peng Luo
    • , Sarah E. Wolf
    •  & Zahra Fakhraai

  • Article |

    Understanding mesoscale structure and dynamics in organic mixed ionic–electronic conductors is crucial. Mesoscale strain kinetics and structural hysteresis have been studied, and they uncover the coupling between charge carrier dynamics and mesoscale order in organic mixed ionic–electronic conductors.

    • Ruiheng Wu
    • , Dilara Meli
    •  & Christopher J. Takacs

  • Perspective |

    Two-dimensional (2D) materials, despite their small thickness, can display chirality that enables prominent asymmetric optical, electrical transport, and magnetic properties. This Perspective discusses the intriguing physics enabled by the structural chirality and the possible ways to create and control chirality in 2D materials.

    • Hanyu Zhu
    •  & Boris I. Yakobson

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