Themed collection Nanoscale 10th Anniversary Special Issue

Celebrating 10 years of Nanoscale.

The many fundamental properties of ultrasmall noble metal nanoclusters have made it increasingly clear that they possess enormous potential for photo- and electro-catalytic applications due to their unique electronic and optical properties.

Isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC) is a complementary technique that can be used for investigations of protein adsorption on nanomaterials, as it quantifies the thermodynamic parameters of intermolecular interactions in situ.

This review highlights various strategies to develop AIE dots through controlling different energy decay pathways for applications in NIR bioimaging and phototherapy.

Pseudocapacitive materials and non-aqueous hybrid capacitors represent promising strategies to realize fast-charging technologies. This minireview provides fundamentals and recent developments of these two growing research fields.

A critical analysis of the synthesis routes, properties and optical features of Ag₂S nanoparticles is presented. The future perspectives of this material for advanced bioimaging are discussed.

This mini-Review summarizes the fusion growth patterns of metal nanoclusters based upon M₄, M₁₃ and M₁₄ building blocks.

We highlight the recent progress in the practical applications of C-Dots, with particular attention to the research in light-emitting devices, bioimaging and biodetection, catalysis, functional materials, and agriculture.

The combination of computational chemistry and computational materials science with machine learning and artificial intelligence provides a powerful way of relating structural features of nanomaterials with functional properties.

Plasma processing is effective in diverse modifications of nanoscale 2D-TMDC materials, owing to its uniquely controllable, effective and clean characteristics.

Decentralized manufacturing is advocated to promote biomimetic manufacturing through the cooperation of digitization-based 3D printing technology and nanomaterials design.

Kinds of portable electrospinning devices for in situ personal wound care including hand-held spinneret, battery powered and generator powered ones were reviewed.

Multifunctional platforms will play a key role and gain more prominence in the field of personalized healthcare worldwide in the near future due to the ever-increasing number of patients suffering from cancer.

2D materials and their hybrid structures have high application prospects in broadband photodetection, making them promising complements to traditional schemes.

Overview of NCs-based bacterial sensing strategies.

Electrochemical measurements with single-crystal electrodes reveal the facet-dependent chemistry that causes anisotropic growth of metal nanocrystals.

Template-mediated synthesis using reactive nanotemplates via various chemical conversion reactions to yield highly efficient electrocatalysts.

Perovskite QDs are promising platforms for light-emitting applications. Advances in perovskite QDs, including optoelectronic properties and device performance are discussed.

Lithium-ion sulfur batteries as a new energy storage system with high capacity and enhanced safety have been emphasized, and their development has been summarized in this review.

The solid electrolyte interface (SEI) is a passivation layer formed on the surface of lithium-ion battery (LIB) anode materials produced by electrolyte decomposition.

Versatile design strategies for fabricating no-wash electrochemical biosensors are deeply summarized and the challenges and future prospects are presented.

Based on the good characteristics of graphene, many physiological signals can be detected by graphene sensors covering the human body. Graphene wearable sensors have great potential in healthcare and telemedicine.

We review the synthesis, characterization, and applications of one-dimensional palladium-based nanostructures and provide perspectives on future directions in this field.

High- and low-index faceted metal (Pt, Pd, Ru, Ir, Rh) nanoparticles designed for improved electrocatalytic activity and stability are reviewed.

Monodisperse nanoparticles are successful model systems for understanding structure–property relationships at the nanoscale and applications like catalysis and nanomedicine.

We present a thorough review on the advances of the aerosol spray processes for synthesis of nanostructured materials for next-generation rechargeable batteries, including the insights into formation mechanism, current status, and future outlook.

This paper reviews nanostructural tungsten oxides and their nanocomposites to enhance the activity of photoelectrochemical water splitting.

The ever-increasing global energy demand and rising price of raw materials adopted in currently prevalent lithium ion batteries (LIBs) have boosted the development of potassium ion batteries (KIBs).

We report the photocatalytic performance of composites prepared in a one-step process by liquid phase exfoliation of graphite and TiO₂ at atmospheric pressure and in water, without heat or surfactants, starting from low-cost commercial reagents.

We report a facile and scalable microwave approach to directly synthesize nanostructured Li₂S which presents an ideal architecture for the construction of free-standing cathodes for all-solid-state Li–S batteries.

While a large number of studies deal with biomedical applications of various types of nanoparticles synthesized using wet chemistry, we propose the concept of targeted biosynthesis of nanoparticles in the living brain.

The integration of large-scale 2D bimetallic Ag/Au nanodisk arrays with gold nanoparticles is developed for sensing DNA conformation with the assistance of 3D finite-difference time-domain simulation.

2D all-covalent networks of Au nanoparticles, interconnected with hygroscopic organic linkers, act as highly sensitive humidity sensor. The interparticle distance changes in presence of moisture to reversibly trigger plasmonic coupling collectively.

Functionalization and patterning of nanocellulose with tannin–metal ion complexes.

WO₃ nanosheets rich in oxygen vacancies are efficient for electrocatalytic N₂-to-NH₃ fixation under ambient conditions with a NH₃ yield of 17.28 μg h⁻¹ mg_cat.⁻¹ and a faradaic efficiency of 7.0% in 0.1 M HCl.

Molecular hydrogen is widely considered as a potential carbon-free and renewable energy carrier for a sustainable energy strategy. Carbon nanotubes are widely promoted as metal-free catalysts – however, we show that the metallic impurities drive hydrogen production.

Vacuum channel diodes have the potential to serve as a platform for converting free-space electromagnetic radiation into electronic signals within ultrafast timescales.

Atomically thin black phosphorus (BP) field-effect transistors have excellent potential for sensing applications.

Visualization can be a useful precursor to quantitative machine learning methods for uncovering structure/property relationships.

Quantitative intramolecular FRET from a porphyrazine to pentacene enhances singlet fission with triplet quantum yields up to 200% ± 20% in benzonitrile.

For efficient cancer vaccines, the antitumor function largely relies on cytotoxic T cells, whose activation can be effectively induced via antigen-encoding mRNA, making mRNA-based cancer vaccines an attractive approach for personalized cancer therapy.

The highly anisotropic electron mobility and electrical conductance of β-Te can be controlled by strain-engineering and the direction of electrical conductance of β-Te can be changed from the armchair to the zigzag direction at a strain between −1% and 0%.

Janus Ag/Ag₂S beads with enhanced photothermal conversion ability and good biosafety ablate macrophages from the original state of artery inflammation.

Polydopamine functionalized cobalt-doped lanthanum nickelate perovskite nanorods for with high intrinsic activity for electrochemical oxygen evolution reaction.

Designing an efficient and stable hole transport layer (HTL) material is one of the essential ways to improve the performance of organic–inorganic perovskite solar cells (PSCs).

The heating ability of bimetallic octopods strongly depends on their size, branch dimensions and gold-palladium ratio.

A cancer cell membrane-based biomimetic strategy was developed by loading doxorubicin and icotinib to overcome drug-resistance of EGFR-mutation lung cancer.

This manuscript presents a new single-step flame route to making multicomponent metal-decorated crumpled reduced graphene oxide balls.

Iodide migration and leaching out of the perovskite towards the metal, forming metal iodides, is identified as the main driving force behind the interaction between these two nanocrystals, eventually leading to the degradation of the perovskite.

Heterostructured quantum dots (hetero-QDs) have outstanding optical properties and chemical/photostability, which make them promising building blocks for use in various optoelectronic devices.

This work demonstrated the efficacy of Prussian blue analogue nanoparticles as effective scavengers of reactive oxygen species under plasma-controlled cellular stress conditions and a booster of ethanol fuel production by yeast fermentation.

Direct binding of sacrificial electron donors to the surface of titania nanocrystals significantly promotes photocatalytic reduction reactions.

Plasmon resonance and energy transfer are integrated to prepare nano-photosensitizers with enhanced two-photon excitation fluorescence and singlet oxygen generation ability.

This article shows that the structure of protein HP35 is well preserved on the Pt(100) crystal surface, whereas it is severely disrupted on Pt(111), due to a distinct water behavior in the first solvation shell of the two Pt crystal surfaces.

A first-principles study demonstrates that spin polarization and tunable valley degeneracy can be induced in the MoS₂ monolayer on a Cr₂O₃ substrate via the magnetic proximity effect.

Quantification of the effect of partial dehalogenation on SAMN of a bromo-substituted heterotriangulene molecule by a comprehensive DFT/MC model.

Dual-template method was proposed to synthesize multiscale porous Fe–N–C catalysts, which exhibited a superior ORR performance in comparison with that of commercial Pt/C.

Inelastic electron noise spectroscopy technique combining a high-bias shot noise with vibration-induced two level fluctuations.

Microglia-targeting ceria–zirconia nanoparticles enhance the analgesic effect of nerve injury-induced neuropathic pain.

The nucleation theory is revisited to understand the unexpected ferroelectric phase formation in HfO₂-based thin films. Considering the two-step phase transition from amorphous doped HfO₂, the ferroelectric phase formation can be understood.

Photo annealing system under dry condition has been developed to fabricate low temperature amorphous TiO₂ electron extraction layer for perovskite solar cells.

We describe exfoliation and subsequent modification of calcium germanide, which yields layered germanium materials with alkyl or aryl groups. Different organic functional group covalently derivatized layered germananes exhibit very intense fluorescence.

Deposition of PbO₂ and dissolution of Au are electrochemically driven at selected sites of Au nanoparticles on a transparent electrode on the basis of hole ejection from the plasmonic resonance sites.

This study presents an example of how to prepare low-palladium PdCuCo alloy nanowires as improved anode electrocatalysts for direct ethanol fuel cells.

We have engineered macroscopic 3D porous networks of gold nanoparticles (AuNPs) chemically interconnected by di-thiolated ethylene glycol oligomers.

The interfacial icelike water layer contributed to hole doping in the graphene through charge transfer from graphene to the icelike water layer.

A new electrochemical method, namely the Li electrochemical tuning method, is introduced in this work to fabricate 1D NiMo nanowires, which display high activity towards the hydrogen evolution reaction in alkaline media.

Sulfur adsorption on Au(111) at high coverage has been studied by density functional calculations.

Graphene oxide complexed with calcium phosphate nanoparticles enhances bone regeneration through signalling between monocytes and mesenchymal stem cells.

Carbon fullerene fragments with low group-symmetry are highly active catalysts for the oxygen reduction reaction.