Themed collection Popular Advances

We have shed light on the recent advances in imprinting chirality into achiral inorganic nanomaterials using organic chiral molecules, their structural analysis, growth mechanism, optical, optoelectronic, and bio-applications.

Diverse applications have been reported for MXenes owing to their extraordinary physicochemical properties and various chemical compositions.

An account of the fundamental chemical and engineering principles of solid amine-based CO₂ adsorbents and their industrial application, with discussion of the relevance of amine chemistry in CO₂ utilisation technology.

This paper presents a review of research progress for biomass-derived hard carbon materials for sodium-ion storage.

Electrohydrodynamic jet printing is a promising technology for high-resolution direct printing. This review provides a comprehensive summary of the fabrication and printing methods of various functional materials (and inks) for practical devices.

Applications of self-driven optoelectronic devices based on a wide array of organolead halide perovskites.

We provide a comprehensive review of advanced membrane materials for organic solvent separations exhibiting superior and robust separation properties, including polymeric architectures and porous materials with well-controlled nanostructures.

Lithium–sulfur batteries, with a high specific capacity, low cost and environmental friendliness, could be investigated as a next-generation energy-storage system.

The physiochemical aspects of the matrix play an important role in deciding the loading of sulfur cathodes.

In this review, we summarize non-toxic perovskite nanocrystals incorporated in solar cells. We also discuss factors limiting efficiency, the approaches followed to overcome these limitations, and possible solutions to improve efficiency.

Although the interest in lithium recycling is increasing the current global lithium recycling rate is lower than 1%. For this reason, our paper aims to explain the needs, current state and future directions of lithium recycling technologies.

TiFe-based alloys are key materials for large-scale applications based on solid-state hydrogen storage. A comprehensive overview is here provided on chemical substitutions in TiFe for tuning at will their reversible hydrogen storage properties.

In recent years, inorganic CsPbBr₃-based perovskites have accomplished considerable progress owing to their superior stability under harsh humid environment.

Direct Ink Writing is a promising technique for the sustainable fabrication of energy devices with arbitrary architectures.

Are classical nucleation theory and the 1950 LaMer model of particle formation supported for a wide range of particle formations, or do competing models in the form of chemical reaction mechanisms have better experimental support? Read on to find out.

Metal/mineral-incorporating materials for toxic Cr(VI) removal.

Recent advances in both the core components of carbon-based supercapacitors have been summarized with regard to large-capacitance electrodes and high-potential electrolytes for fabricating high-energy, large-power, and long-running devices.

Thermoelectrics can recover waste heat, environmental heat or heats from different sources and convert it to electricity.

This review presents the recent progress on NIR fluorescent protein and bioluminescence-based probes with high-resolution in vivo imaging techniques.

The present review article focuses on novel findings corresponding to the structural and photophysical properties of carbon dots. The article also highlights unique characteristics of crystalline dots that offer new chemistry and thus new application potential.

A comprehensive investigation of size- and optical-response-controlled chiral nanomaterials from morphological analysis to a fundamental understanding.

Due to the desirable film-forming ability and morphological stability, a new bipolar Ir(III) complex FMPPHC can act as a blue emitter and a host sensitizing efficient saturated red light in wet-process emitting systems.

MXene quantum dots (MQDs) were anchored on the surface of Ni–Co LDH via the surface spatial confinement effect to boost the electrochemical activity and stability.

Multi-channel adjustable CPL in chiral liquid crystals was investigated, where a well-organized structure distributed in double thin layers exhibits a high |g_lum| for the input signal to encrypt information transmission.

The resonance Raman signal enhancement of crystal violet dyes onto the two-dimensional MXene–Ti₃C₂T_x film, so called MXenes-enhanced resonance Raman scattering (MERRS), is reported with a calculated enhancement factor of 3.42 × 10⁹.

In this work, we introduce a bilayer ETL composed of lithium (Li)-doped compact SnO₂ (c-SnO₂) and potassium-capped SnO₂ nanoparticle layers (NP-SnO₂) to enhance the electron extraction and charge transport properties in perovskite solar cells, resulting in an improved PCE and a strongly reduced J–V hysteresis.

Tethering of two shape mismatched donors and acceptor leads to an unusual mesogen design.

The combination of block copolymer self-assembly and polymer phase separation with sol–gel chemistry enables the optimisation of Li₄Ti₅O₁₂ (LTO) microspheres with size-tuneable carbon-coated mesopores, resulting in excellent electrochemical performance.

We have fabricated n-type silicon solar cells using ALD deposited vanadium oxide as the front transparent contact.

Spider silk-inspired peptide multiblock hybrid copolymers composed of alternately aligned self-assembling oligopeptides and flexible polypropylene glycol were newly designed for functional nano/microfilm materials.

The rich cation vacancies CoFe_V-LDH with excellent OER properties was synthesized by tunable alkali etching. Pt was anchored within vacancies (Pt@CoFe_V-LDH) by UV reduction to optimize its HER and ORR performance.

We work towards a rational design process for organic salt phase change materials, using X-ray crystallography to probe the structure–property relationship between hydrogen bonding and the enthalpy of fusion in these materials.

We report two blue-emitting thermally activated delayed fluorescence (TADF) compounds employing a substituted carbazolophane (Czp) donor (indolo[2.2]paracyclophane).

High-field/high-frequency electron paramagnetic resonance spectroscopy was employed to synthesize melanin to provide relevant information on the carbon-centered free-radical nature of this biomaterial.

The saturation of iridescent structural colours of silica colloidal film is significantly improved by addition of a small amount of the monodisperse spherical black carbon nanoparticles which are uniformly dispersed in a colloidal crystal matrix.

Anions in organic salts are used to tune photoluminescence properties, especially TADF and RTP. Bromide facilitates RISC and give short delayed lifetimes while tetrafluoroborate leads to RTP with afterglow.

Herein, we report the unique usage of glassy core micelles for the fabrication of mesoporous carbons with independent control of the material wall thickness and the template dimensions.

In situ growth of the MFM-300(Fe) on an ultra-thin sheet of graphitic carbon nitride, formed by exfoliation using supercritical CO₂, is reported. The resultant composite CNNS/MFM-300(Fe) shows excellent performance in photocatalytic aerobic oxidation of benzylic C–H groups.

We report a macromolecular design concept to develop humidity-responsive polymers with simultaneously improved mechanical properties and 3D printability, while still displaying fast, reversible and complex shape transformations.

Garnet-type solid electrolytes with cubic modification are considered to be one of the most promising candidates for SSLBs with desirable properties such as high ionic conductivity at room temperature, and wider electrochemical operational window.

Star-shaped gold nanoparticles with encoded molecular information can be used in security inks for anticounterfeiting applications.

Electrochromic devices (ECDs) containing iron-based metallo-supramolecular polymers (Fe-MEPE) and Prussian blue (PB) as electrode materials, polymer electrolyte and flexible ultra-thin ITO glass as transparent conductive substrate are demonstrated.

Two novel distinct multi-stimuli responsive mechanochromic luminescence (MCL) materials were prepared with an asymmetric D–A–D′ scaffold.

A fluorescent hydroxyl- and hydrazone-based covalent organic framework (TFPB–DHTH COF) was synthesized as an “OFF–ON” fluorescent sensor for cysteine and L-histidine.

A structure map for AB₂ type monolayers of 3844 compounds is constructed by high-throughput DFT calculations with the symmetry-unconstrained geometry optimizations starting from ferromagnetic 1T, 1H and planar structures as initial states.

High-quality elastomer-immobilized colloidal crystal films with low particle volume fractions demonstrated a full-colour change from red to blue with high uniformity, achieved by varying the mole fraction of monomers in the hydrogel or stretching.

A self-assembling, biporous covalent organic framework has been constructed from a single monomer and applied to gas separations. Coordination of transition metals in the monomer leads to highly ordered arrangements of metals in the 2D-materials.

Chiral polydiacetylene nanotubes have been fabricated via the supramolecular gelation of PCDA and C4-MOP, which exhibited multiple color transitions to external stimuli.

This work indicates that carefully selected acceptor units can lead to a localized spin topology and a high-spin (S = 1) ground-state with a pure diradical (y₀ = 1) character suitable for organic magnetic materials.

Hexylammonium iodide post deposition treatment forms a passivation layer on top of the 3D perovskite which enhance the device efficiency.

Two homologous series of thioether-linked liquid crystal dimers with oppositely directed esters, viz. CBCOOnSCB and CBOCOnSCB, exhibit largely different helical pitches in the N_TB phase, which are ascribed to their molecular bend or biaxiality.

The BiOX/g-C₃N₄ composites showed enhanced photocatalytic performance towards organic pollutant degradation owing to the boosted charge transfer over the binary interfaces.

Single Sc/Ti atoms supported on TCNQ monolayers have been explored as outstanding electrocatalysts for nitrogen reduction.

Here, we report the successful fabrication of highly dispersed ultrafine Ni nanoparticles (NPs) embraced into the partially carbonized Ni-MOF-74 (Ni NPs/C@Ni-MOF-74) microrod arrays by the heat treatment of the rod-like Ni-MOF-74 arrays grown on Ni foam.

Tuning the membrane porosity in microfluidics with co-assembled nanoparticles as templates for enhanced mass transport and biomacromolecule gradient generation.