Surface chemistry articles from across Nature Portfolio

Electrochemical hydride (H^–) transfer has been an elusive process. Now, using well-designed model systems, the phenomenon has been isolated and further demonstrated as a practical synthetic method with H₂ gas as the hydrogen source.

A second-harmonic generation approach enables the direct measurement of the potential of zero charge at electrochemical interfaces.

The adiabatic approximation is often applied to describe the scattering of molecules or atoms from solid surfaces. Now, unusual energy loss has been observed during the scattering of hyperthermal hydrogen atoms from a single crystalline Ge(111) surface — suggesting the existence of a non-adiabatic mechanism involving electronic interband transitions in the Ge that are induced by the hydrogen atoms.

An organic quantum magnet has been prepared in short chains of porphyrin derivatives through a combination of on-surface synthesis and atom manipulation using the tip of a scanning probe microscope.

[n]cycloparaphenylenes feature extensive para-conjugation that leads to useful electronic and optoelectronic properties, but their strained topology prevents their conversion into planar macrocycles. Now, on-surface coupling of cleverly designed precursors affords planar π-extended [12]cycloparaphenylene.