Structural materials articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Four-dimensional (4D) printing ceramics is a challenge due to their weak deformability. Here, the authors report a hydrogel-dehydration-driven direct 4D printing approach, enabling simple and efficient manufacturing of various complex ceramic objects

    • Rong Wang
    • , Chao Yuan
    •  & Qi Ge

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Understanding how hydrogen embrittles steels and developing the solutions are crucial for enabling the hydrogen economy. Here, the authors report a materials design strategy that can increase the hydrogen trapping capacity by creating carbon vacancies in metal carbide precipitates via microalloying.

    • Pang-Yu Liu
    • , Boning Zhang
    •  & Yi-Sheng Chen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The fabrication of polymeric membranes with high permeance and remarkable selectivity for simultaneous H2 purification and CO2 capture is challenging. Here, the authors design a polymer membrane with sub-micro pores via controlled transformation of amine-linked polymer films into benzimidazole- and amine-linked polymer layers.

    • Xueru Yan
    • , Tianqi Song
    •  & Xinlei Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Process development for 3D printing of new metal alloys can be time-consuming and variability in the printing outcome makes it even more challenging. Here, authors demonstrate an in-situ method using high-speed imaging and deep learning to accelerate the process design for a more consistent quality.

    • David Guirguis
    • , Conrad Tucker
    •  & Jack Beuth

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Deformation twinning in body-centered cubic (BCC) metals is generally believed to be controlled by twin nucleation, but facilitated by rapid twin growth once the nucleation energy barrier is overcome. Here, the authors demonstrate both nucleation- and growth-controlled twinning modes in BCC Ta nanocrystals depending on the crystal size.

    • Li Zhong
    • , Yin Zhang
    •  & Scott X. Mao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Understanding the underlying mechanisms during corrosion is one of the grand key missions to improve the sustainability of the material world. Here, the authors combine atomic scale imaging and calculations to show how solute atoms react during aqueous corrosion of a multicomponent Al alloy.

    • Huan Zhao
    • , Yue Yin
    •  & Dierk Raabe

  • 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

    A shellular is a micro-architectured material, composed of a continuous smooth-curved thin shell in the form of a triply periodic minimal surface. Here, authors propose schellular designs applied to pressure vessels and demonstrate its competitive practical features against spherical and cylindrical vessels.

    • Yoon Chang Jeong
    • , Seung Chul Han
    •  & Kiju Kang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    It is still challenging to study the atomistic mechanism of inelastic deformation in metallic glasses owing to their amorphous structure. Here, the authors report an anomalous temperature dependence of the onset of plasticity in metallic glasses at low temperature.

    • Yifan Wang
    • , Jing Liu
    •  & Wei Cai

  • Article
    | Open Access

    An abnormal stress memory effect is discovered in different types of glassy materials when they are subjected to a low strain after a high strain. This strategy can be used to depress the stress relaxation and increase the stability under loading.

    • Yu Tong
    • , Lijian Song
    •  & Jun-Qiang Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Body-centered cubic refractory metals are known to exhibit excellent high-temperature strength, but often suffer from brittle fracture. Here, the authors produce a bulk pure Mo with stable fine-grain structure after powder metallurgy, Y-type hot rolling and ultra-high temperature annealing (1000~1700 °C) that exhibits room temperature superplasticity.

    • Wenshuai Chen
    • , Xiyao Li
    •  & Zenglin Zhou

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Microporous polymer ligand provides particle size reduction, enhanced ultramicroporosity (3–4 Å), and better colloidal stability in the polymer–metal–organic framework (polyMOF) system. This leads to defect-free and scalable composite membranes for efficient CO2 separation.

    • Tae Hoon Lee
    • , Byung Kwan Lee
    •  & Ho Bum Park

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Stress concentrations make the design of durable interfaces between hard and soft materials a challenging task. Here, the authors, inspired by nature, combine mechanical tests and simulations on multiple geometries to generate design guidelines that yield strong and tough soft-hard interfaces.

    • M. C. Saldívar
    • , E. Tay
    •  & A. A. Zadpoor

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In the pursuit of advancing laser powder bed fusion (LPBF) technology, researchers have successfully converged the realms of sound and light. Here, the authors unveil the synergistic potential of synchronized x-ray imaging and acoustics to illuminate hidden instabilities in LPBF process.

    • Milad Hamidi Nasab
    • , Giulio Masinelli
    •  & Roland E. Logé

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The nucleation of calcium silicate hydrate is a crucial step in cement hydration, but is still a poorly understood process. Here the authors use atomistic simulations to study primary particles and their aggregation, revealing a potential C-S-H “basic building block”.

    • Xabier M. Aretxabaleta
    • , Jon López-Zorrilla
    •  & Hegoi Manzano

  • Article
    | Open Access

    This work introduces a 2D porphyrinic metal-organic framework based on DCS origami tessellation, displaying unique folding behavior inspired by origami mechanics. This breakthrough paves the way for MOFs toward mechanical metamaterials.

    • Eunji Jin
    • , In Seong Lee
    •  & Wonyoung Choe

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Ice formation on grooved surfaces is ubiquitous, but controlling orientation is difficult due to lack of mechanistic insight. Here, the authors observed oriented growth using graphene oxide nanosheets as probes, revealing the effect of groove size, and programmed ice growth to fabricate freeze-cast metamaterials.

    • Meng Li
    • , Nifang Zhao
    •  & Hao Bai

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The design of highly permeable polyamide (PA) membrane capable of precise ionic sieving remains challenging. Here, the authors report an anhydrous interfacial polymerization on the solid-liquid interface to eliminate water-caused side reactions, leading to a PA layer with an ionic sieving accuracy of 0.5 Å.

    • Guangjin Zhao
    • , Haiqi Gao
    •  & Hong Meng

  • Comment
    | Open Access

    Optimisation tasks in the inverse design of metamaterials with machine learning were limited due to the representations of generative models. Here the author comments a recent publication in Nature Communications which generates a latent space representation that unlocks non-linear optimisations.

    • Angkur Jyoti Dipanka Shaikeea

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Truss metamaterials are ubiquitous but their vast design space is far from fully explored. Here, authors use machine learning to present a unified, continuous latent space description, enabling the rapid generation of trusses with tunable or exceptional linear and nonlinear mechanical properties.

    • Li Zheng
    • , Konstantinos Karapiperis
    •  & Dennis M. Kochmann

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The entanglement of fibrous elements produces flexible structures with enhanced strength and resilience to abrasion. Here, the authors report the weaving of organic crystals into flexible and robust patches with plain, twill, and satin topologies of arbitrary porosity, expanding one-dimensional crystals into flexible, two-dimensional planar structures with potential for future applications in flexible electronics.

    • Linfeng Lan
    • , Liang Li
    •  & Hongyu Zhang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Small-scale metallic materials often suffer from a lack of tensile ductility. Here, the authors report an unusual room-temperature super-elongation in CoCrFeNi nanopillars from spatial and synergistic coordination of deformation twinning and dislocation slips due to chemical heterogeneities.

    • Qian Zhang
    • , Ranming Niu
    •  & Xiaoyan Li

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Achieving reversible phase transformation of shape memory ceramics (SMCs) in a densified composite can have scientific and technological impacts, but is challenging. Here, the authors demonstrate the reversible martensitic transformation of SMCs confined in aluminum without destructive impact.

    • Wangshu Zheng
    • , Yan Shi
    •  & Qiang Guo

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Mechanically robust, flexible and thermally insulating ceramic aerogels are challenging to obtain due to the conflicting nature of these properties. Here the authors resolved these contradictions and developed a strong yet flexible aerogel, for application in extreme conditions, by laminated structure design.

    • Lei Su
    • , Shuhai Jia
    •  & Hongjie Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The traditional way of beating metals to improve their properties is not practical to 3D printed parts with intricate geometry. Here, the authors demonstrate how to program microstructural modifications of metals site-specifically during 3D printing to tune their properties.

    • Shubo Gao
    • , Zhi Li
    •  & Matteo Seita

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Complex computerized geometries can be obtained by additive manufacturing. However, the printing of purely three-dimensional polymer shapes possesses inherent poor mechanical stability. Here, the authors overcome this drawback by the light-driven orientation of liquid crystals to guide the alignment of acrylate prepolymers along the direction parallel to UV light vibrations.

    • Xiaolu Sun
    • , Shaoyun Chen
    •  & Dongxian Zhuo

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Smart monitoring devices with integrated mechanical protection and piezoelectric induction are limited. Here, the authors report a strategy to grow piezoelectric Rochelle salt crystals in 3D-printed cuttlebone-inspired structures to produce smart monitoring devices with integrated mechanical protection and electrical sensing capability.

    • Qingqing He
    • , Yushun Zeng
    •  & Yang Yang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Under-liquid joining of metals has far-reaching implications for energy storage, space exploration, offshore mining and defense. Here, the authors report an alternative method to join metallic glasses firmly under water, seawater, flammable alcohol and even cryogenic liquid nitrogen.

    • Luyao Li
    • , Xin Li
    •  & Jiang Ma

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Physical realizations of time crystals, non-equilibrium many-body systems with broken time-translation symmetry, typically require periodic driving. Here the authors demonstrate a time crystal without external periodic drive in a collection of erbium atoms under a continuous laser excitation.

    • Yu-Hui Chen
    •  & Xiangdong Zhang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    How matter deform is a central question in mechanics of materials science. Here, the authors reveal a size-dependent deformation in amorphous metals changing at ~100 nanometer sample size from collective homogeneous flow to interface diffusion realized through individual atomic transport.

    • Naijia Liu
    • , Sungwoo Sohn
    •  & Jan Schroers

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In this work, the authors demonstrate a ‘jointly modulated’ amplifying programmable metasurface (APM) for simultaneous wireless information and power transmission (SWIPT). Their technique outperforms existing methods, significantly improving power transmission and adaptability for conveying energy and data across various domains, including wireless implants, 6 G networks, and IoT systems.

    • Xin Wang
    • , Jia Qi Han
    •  & Tie Jun Cui

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Heterointerface and defect promote the development of electromagnetic wave absorbers. Here, the authors show the 3D flower-honeycomb CuCo2S4@Expanded Graphite heterostructure, report the mechanism of crystal-crystal/amorphous heterointerfaces and cation defects on electromagnetic wave absorption.

    • Zhimeng Tang
    • , Lei Xu
    •  & Jinhui Peng

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Fields of stress and plastic strain tensors in a sample under high pressures in diamond-anvil cells are important, but measuring them is difficult. Here, the authors suggest a coupled experimental-analytical-computational approach to measure them before, during, and after α−ω transformation in Zr.

    • Valery I. Levitas
    • , Achyut Dhar
    •  & K. K. Pandey

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The performance of membrane desalination of seawater is hampered by fouling. Here the authors develop smart gating hybrid membranes by surface coating with polymer-embedded thermosalient crystals. These membranes enhance pure water flux by over 40% in saltwater desalination by osmotic distillation.

    • Elvira Pantuso
    • , Ejaz Ahmed
    •  & Gianluca Di Profio

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Electrocatalytic conversion of low-cost organic compounds to high-value chemicals urgently demands the development of efficient electrocatalysts. Mao et al. report the synthesis of Cu single-atom dispersed Rh metallene arrays for electrochemical aniline synthesis and biomass upgrading with enhanced electrocatalytic activity.

    • Qiqi Mao
    • , Xu Mu
    •  & Hongjing Wang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Embolization is one of the most promising strategies for clinical disease treatments, however, the existing embolic materials normally have poor embolization effectiveness. Here, the authors report Janus particle-engineered structural lipiodol droplets by programming the self-assembly of Janus particles at the lipiodol-water interface to achieve highly efficient renal embolization.

    • Sijian Tao
    • , Bingquan Lin
    •  & Jun-Bing Fan

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