chemistry of materials research article

Department of Chemistry

Materials chemistry.

Materials chemistry is a new and highly interdisciplinary science that involves the use of chemistry for the creation, characterization, and application of materials with interesting or potentially useful physical or chemical characteristics. Substances of interest include inorganic, organic, polymeric, and hybrid materials, and thus materials chemistry incorporates solid-state chemistry, nanoscience, and polymer chemistry. Materials chemistry is central to the development of new technology and the global economy. As we look back, synthetic materials have played a vital role in improving the standard of living and the quality of human life worldwide. Looking forward, materials chemistry will continue to be essential for solving the greatest challenges of our time, from sustainable energy storage and environmental challenges to the development of quantum devices and quantum communication technology.

At Yale, the materials chemistry program has developed rapidly during the past decade. Powered by exceptional research facilities, Yale materials chemists are developing materials with controlled structure, properties, and function by combining novel synthesis and characterization techniques with computational modeling and artificial intelligence methods. Significant contributions have recently been made in energy storage and conversion, environmental remediation, imaging, sensing, and electronics. A shared feature of research is the pursuit for molecular-level understanding of structure-property-function correlations, using experimental and computational techniques. The materials chemistry group collaborates heavily among themselves and with research groups in other departments, as represented in the university’s Energy Sciences Institute , the Center for Research on Interface Structures and Phenomena , and the Yale Quantum Institute . The materials chemistry group is also actively engaged in the DOE-funded Center for Hybrid Approaches to Solar Energy to Liquid Fuels based at the University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, and the 2021 DoD Multidisciplinary Research Program of the University Research Initiative (MURI) for N=N and C-H Bond Activation.

Ongoing research in materials chemistry at Yale includes the preparation of new phases and interfacial structures for advanced battery technologies; the study of the chemistry and electrochemistry of colloids and materials interfaces, such as the chemistry of adsorbed hydrogen on surfaces; and the development of hybrid heterogenized molecular structures on surfaces for the photochemical production of liquid fuels. A goal for the future is to rationally design and characterize active sites in materials for targeted applications.

Fabrication of drug-loaded graded porous Ti6Al4V structures for load-bearing biomedical applications

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Fabrication of folic acid-embedded aminated drug encapsulated zeolitic imidazolate framework as promising drug delivery system for lung cancer

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Synthesis, structural study, optical, dielectric, and electrical properties of a new lead-free C 2 H 5 NH 3 BaCl 3 organic–inorganic hybrid perovskite

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Opto-electronic and thermoelectric properties of double perovskites Li 2 CuGaX 6 (X = Cl, Br, I) for energy conversion applications: DFT calculations

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Deposition of nano-crystalline Cu 2 ZnSnS 4 thin film in one step without sulfurization: Future prospects

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g-C 3 N 4 /TiO 2 nanocomposite coated with zinc oxide for selective photocatalytic degradation of nitrate in aquatic media

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Hydrothermal synthesis of InTiS 3 and Ag 2 InTiS 4 for electrocatalytic water oxidation and photocatalytic dye degradation application

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Experimental and theoretical study of the microstructure evolution and thermal-physical properties of hypereutectic Al–Fe alloys

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The role of fabrication methods and the impact of hydroxyapatite content on PU/HA scaffolds for tissue regeneration

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Inelastic neutron scattering: A unique tool to study hydrogen in materials

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The effect of interface structures on deformation behavior of Cu/Ni multilayer by molecular dynamics

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Analytical methods and applications in materials and life sciences

Ute resch-genger.

Bundesanstalt für Materialforschung und -prüfung (BAM), Richard-Willstätter-Straße 11, 12489 Berlin, Germany

Björn Meermann

Matthias koch, michael g. weller.

Current trends in materials and life sciences are flanked by the need to push detection limits to single molecules or single cells, enable the characterization of increasingly complex matrices or sophisticated nanostructures, speed up the time of analysis, reduce instrument complexity and costs, and improve the reliability of data. This requires suitable analytical tools such as spectroscopic, separation and imaging techniques, mass spectrometry, and hyphenated techniques as well as sensors and their adaptation to application-specific challenges in the environmental, food, consumer product, health sector, nanotechnology, and bioanalysis. Increasing concerns about health threatening known or emerging pollutants in drinking water, consumer products, and food and about the safety of nanomaterials led to a new awareness of the importance of analytical sciences. Another important driver in this direction is the increasing demand by legislation, particularly in view of the 17 sustainable development goals by the United Nations addressing clean energy, industry, and innovation, sustainable cities, clean water, and responsible consumption and production. In this respect, also the development of analytical methods that enable the characterization of material flows in production processes and support recycling concepts of precious raw materials becomes more and more relevant. In the future, this will provide the basis for greener production in the chemical industry utilizing recycled or sustainable starting materials. This makes analytical chemistry an essential player in terms of the circular economy helping to increase the sustainability of production processes. In the life sciences sector, products based on proteins, such as therapeutic and diagnostic antibodies, increase in importance. These increasingly biotechnologically produced functional biomolecules pose a high level of complexity of matrix and structural features that can be met only by highly advanced methods for separation, characterization, and detection. In addition, metrological traceability and target definition are still significant challenges for the future, particularly in the life sciences. However, innovative reference materials as required for the health and food sector and the characterization of advanced materials can only be developed when suitable analytical protocols are available. The so-called reproducibility crisis in sciences underlines the importance of improved measures of quality control for all kinds of measurements and material characterization. This calls for thorough method validation concepts, suitable reference materials, and regular interlaboratory comparisons of measurements as well as better training of scientists in analytical sciences.

The important contribution of analytical sciences to these developments is highlighted by a broad collection of research papers, trend articles, and critical reviews from these different application fields. Special emphasis is dedicated to often-overlooked quality assurance and reference materials.

Biographies

is Head of the Division Biophotonics at the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM). She received her Ph.D. on semiconductor quantum dots from the Technical University Berlin and has then carried out research stages at the University of Texas at Austin and the University of Ottawa focused on the development of functional optical materials and luminescent methods for their characterization. She is co-chair of the steering committee of the Methods and Applications in Fluorescence (MAF) conference series and member of the Editorial Advisory Board of the journals Bioconjugate Chemistry and Methods in Applications in Fluorescence (MAF) and serves as Editorial Board Member for Scientific Reports . She currently leads the “Expert Group Chemists for Government Agencies and the Public Sector” of the German Chemical Society (GDCh) and acts as German expert on luminescent nanomaterials in international standardization committees. Her research interests are focused on molecular and nanocrystalline emitters for the UV/vis/NIR/SWIR, stimuli-responsive optical probes, signal enhancement, multiplexing, and encoding strategies as well as concepts for validating optical-spectroscopic measurements and developing optical reference materials.

is Head of the Division Inorganic Trace Analysis at the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM) and “Habilitand” in Analytical Chemistry at the Humboldt University Berlin. He studied chemistry at the University of Münster and received his Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry. He did a postdoc at the University of Ghent in Belgium on the topic of stable isotopes in terms of speciation analysis and subsequently joined the Federal Institute of Hydrology (BfG) in Koblenz as a research associate. He is a member of the board “Expert Group Analytical Chemistry” of the German Chemical Society (GDCh) as well as Editorial Board member of the Journal of Analytical Atomic Spectrometry (JAAS). His research is located at the interface of materials and environmental sciences and the life sciences with topics like release studies of elements, elemental species, and (nano)particles from materials into the environment, their possible uptake by organisms and cells, and the assessment of the influence of (metal based) materials on the environment. Analytical techniques applied for his research include hyphenated techniques (CE, LC, GC, AF4/ICP-MS), single particle/cell-ICP-ToF-MS, and HR-CS-GFMAS for non-metal analysis.

is Head of the Division Organic Trace and Food Analysis at the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM). He studied chemistry at the Technical University Berlin and received his Ph.D. in Analytical Chemistry from the Humboldt University Berlin. For more than 20 years, he has been conducting research in the field of environmental and food analysis with a focus on the development of chromatographic methods for the detection and quantification of organic contaminants and residues in complex matrices such as soil, food, and consumer products. One of his special interests is the investigation of the fate of organic pollutants by simulating natural transformation processes and identifying transformation products by electrochemistry coupled with high resolution mass spectrometry. He is also active in the development and certification of traceable reference materials for environmental, food and consumer products and involved in the Mass Spectrometry Centre of BAM.

is Head of the Division Protein Analysis at the Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing (BAM). He received his Ph.D. from the Technical University of Munich (TUM) in the field of Analytical Chemistry. Subsequently, he joined the Division of Analytical Chemistry Research at Ciba-Geigy in Basel, Switzerland , for a postdoctoral stay. After leading a bioanalytical research group at TUM, he finished his habilitation in immunochemistry and now teaches bioanalytical chemistry at the Humboldt University Berlin. His research interests include many bioanalytical topics such as immunoassays, biosensors, microarrays, affinity chromatography, monolithic materials, quantitative protein analysis, antibody development, bioconjugation, lab-on-a-chip, and peptide libraries. Furthermore, he is engaged in the design and quality control of bioreagents to tackle and overcome the replication crisis.

Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL.

Published in the topical collection Analytical Methods and Applications in the Materials and Life Sciences with guest editors Ute Resch-Genger, Matthias Koch, Björn Meermann, and Michael G. Weller.

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Springer Nature remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations.

Scientists deliver quantum algorithm to develop new materials and chemistry

U .S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) scientists have published the Cascaded Variational Quantum Eigensolver (CVQE) algorithm in a recent Physical Review Research article. The algorithm is expected to become a powerful tool to investigate the physical properties in electronic systems.

The CVQE algorithm is a variant of the Variational Quantum Eigensolver (VQE) algorithm that only requires the execution of a set of quantum circuits once rather than at every iteration during the parameter optimization process, thereby increasing the computational throughput.

"Both algorithms produce a quantum state close to the ground state of a system, which is used to determine many of the system's physical properties," said John Stenger, Ph.D., a Theoretical Chemistry Section research physicist. "Calculations that previously took months can now be performed in hours."

The CVQE algorithm uses a quantum computer to probe the needed probability mass functions and a classical computer to perform the remaining calculations, including the energy minimization.

"Finding the minimum energy is computationally hard as the size of the state space grows exponentially with the system size," said Steve Hellberg, Ph.D., a Theory of Advanced Functional Materials Section research physicist. "Except for very small systems, even the world's most powerful supercomputers are unable to find the exact ground state."

To address this challenge, scientists use a quantum computer with a qubit register, whose state space also increases exponentially, in this case with qubits. By representing the states of a physical system on the state space of the register, a quantum computer can be used to simulate the states in the exponentially large representation space of the system.

Data can subsequently be extracted by quantum measurements. As quantum measurements are not deterministic, the quantum circuit executions must be repeated multiple times to estimate probability distributions describing the states, a process known as sampling. Variational quantum algorithms, including the CVQE algorithm, identify trial states by a set of parameters that are optimized to minimize the energy.

"The key difference between the original VQE method and the new CVQE method is that the sampling and optimization processes have been decoupled in the latter such that the sampling can be performed exclusively on the quantum computer and the parameters processed exclusively on a classical computer," said Dan Gunlycke, D.Phil., Theoretical Chemistry Section Head, who also leads the NRL quantum computing effort.

"The new approach also has other benefits. The form of the solution space does not have to comport with the symmetry requirements of the qubit register, and therefore, it is much easier to shape the solution space and implement symmetries of the system and other physically motivated constraints, which will ultimately lead to more accurate predictions of electronic system properties," Gunlycke continued.

Quantum computing is a component of quantum science, which has been designated as a Critical Technology Area within the USD(R&E) Technology Vision for an Era of Competition by the Under Secretary of Defense for Research and Engineering Heidi Shyu.

"Understanding the properties of quantum-mechanical systems is essential in the development of new materials and chemistry for the Navy and Marine Corps," Gunlycke said. "Corrosion, for instance, is an omnipresent challenge costing the Department of Defense billions every year. The CVQE algorithm can be used to study the chemical reactions causing corrosion and provide critical information to our existing anticorrosion teams in their quest to develop better coatings and additives."

For decades, NRL has been conducting fundamental research in quantum science, which has the potential to yield disruptive Defense technologies for precision, navigation, and timing; quantum sensing; quantum computing; and quantum networking.

More information: Daniel Gunlycke et al, Cascaded variational quantum eigensolver algorithm, Physical Review Research (2024). DOI: 10.1103/PhysRevResearch.6.013238

Provided by Naval Research Laboratory

Revolutionary molecular device unleashes potential for targeted drug delivery and self-healing materials

In a new breakthrough that could revolutionise medical and material engineering, scientists have developed a first-of-its-kind molecular device that controls the release of multiple small molecules using force.

The researchers from The University of Manchester describe a force-controlled release system that harnesses natural forces to trigger targeted release of molecules, which could significantly advance medical treatment and smart materials.

The discovery, published today in the journal Nature , uses a novel technique using a type of interlocked molecule known as rotaxane. Under the influence of mechanical force -- such as that observed at an injured or damaged site -- this component triggers the release of functional molecules, like medicines or healing agents, to precisely target the area in need. For example, the site of a tumour.

It also holds promise for self-healing materials that can repair themselves in situ when damaged, prolonging the lifespan of these materials. For example, a scratch on a phone screen.

Guillaume De Bo, Professor of Organic Chemistry at The University of Manchester, said: "Forces are ubiquitous in nature and play pivotal roles in various processes. Our aim was to exploit these forces for transformative applications, particularly in material durability and drug delivery.

"Although this is only a proof-of-concept design, we believe that our rotaxane-based approach holds immense potential with far reaching applications -- we're on the brink of some truly remarkable advancements in healthcare and technology."

Traditionally, the controlled release of molecules with force has presented challenges in releasing more than one molecule at once, usually operating through a molecular "tug of war" game where two polymers pull at either side to release a single molecule.

The new approach involves two polymer chains attached to a central ring-like structure that slide along an axle supporting the cargo, effectively releasing multiple cargo molecules in response to force application. The scientists demonstrated the release of up to five molecules simultaneously with the possibility of releasing more, overcoming previous limitations.

The breakthrough marks the first time scientists have been able to demonstrate the ability to release more than one component, making it one of the most efficient release systems to date.

The researchers also show versatility of the model by using different types of molecules, including drug compounds, fluorescent markers, catalyst and monomers, revealing the potential for a wealth of future applications.

Looking ahead, the researchers aim to delve deeper into self-healing applications, exploring whether two different types of molecules can be released at the same time. For example, the integration of monomers and catalysts could enable polymerization at the site of damage, creating an integrated self-healing system within materials.

They will also look to expand the sort of molecules that can be released.

Prof De Bo said: "We've barely scratched the surface of what this technology can achieve. The possibilities are limitless, and we're excited to explore further."

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Story Source:

Materials provided by University of Manchester . Note: Content may be edited for style and length.

Journal Reference :

• Lei Chen, Robert Nixon, Guillaume De Bo. Force-controlled release of small molecules with a rotaxane actuator . Nature , 2024; 628 (8007): 320 DOI: 10.1038/s41586-024-07154-0

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Strange & offbeat.

Journal of Materials Chemistry B

Vaccine adjuvants: current status, research and development, licensing, and future opportunities.

* Corresponding authors

a Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA E-mail: [email protected]

b Department of Bioengineering, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA

c Department of Molecular and Medical Pharmacology, David Geffen School of Medicine, University of California, Los Angeles, CA 90095, USA E-mail: [email protected]

Vaccines represent one of the most significant inventions in human history and have revolutionized global health. Generally, a vaccine functions by triggering the innate immune response and stimulating antigen-presenting cells, leading to a defensive adaptive immune response against a specific pathogen's antigen. As a key element, adjuvants are chemical materials often employed as additives to increase a vaccine's efficacy and immunogenicity. For over 90 years, adjuvants have been essential components in many human vaccines, improving their efficacy by enhancing, modulating, and prolonging the immune response. Here, we provide a timely and comprehensive review of the historical development and the current status of adjuvants, covering their classification, mechanisms of action, and roles in different vaccines. Additionally, we perform systematic analysis of the current licensing processes and highlights notable examples from clinical trials involving vaccine adjuvants. Looking ahead, we anticipate future trends in the field, including the development of new adjuvant formulations, the creation of innovative adjuvants, and their integration into the broader scope of systems vaccinology and vaccine delivery. The article posits that a deeper understanding of biochemistry, materials science, and vaccine immunology is crucial for advancing vaccine technology. Such advancements are expected to lead to the future development of more effective vaccines, capable of combating emerging infectious diseases and enhancing public health.

• This article is part of the themed collections: Journal of Materials Chemistry B Recent Review Articles and Journal of Materials Chemistry B Emerging Investigators 2024

Article information

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Y. Cui, M. Ho, Y. Hu and Y. Shi, J. Mater. Chem. B , 2024, Advance Article , DOI: 10.1039/D3TB02861E

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Self-dyeing vegan leather made by genetically engineered bacteria

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Genetically engineered bacteria have been designed to produce self-dyeing, vegan, plastic-free leather. The work, carried out by UK-based researchers, could offer a more sustainable alternative to traditional leather and the associated chemical dyeing processes.

‘By 2050, after food and construction, materials for textiles and fabrics will be the third biggest polluter in the world – fashion and textiles already contribute more to carbon emissions than all of aviation and shipping combined,’ explains Tom Ellis , a synthetic biologist at Imperial College London who led the project. ‘In terms of carbon use, by far the worst material used in the fashion industry, is leather – the amount of land use and CO 2 and methane emissions associated with farming cows and then producing leather is crazy.’

‘Then on top of that, dying leather a different colour and cleaning it in a way that it becomes the material you want is also terrible,’ he adds. ‘The tanning process uses chromium and to get that black colour – the most popular colour for leather – you have to use azo dyes and that creates a huge amount of wastewater and chemical residue.’

To find a solution, the researchers turned to bacterial cellulose, a natural biomaterial that has been considered as an alternative to leather for over a decade. The Imperial team’s unique approach involved genetically engineering Komagataeibacter rhaeticus ( K. rhaeticus ) bacteria to express tyrosinase-related protein 1 – a gene associated with the production of the melanin pigment eumelanin. This produced a bacterial strain that grows self-pigmenting bacterial cellulose.

Source: © Imperial College London

‘Nature tells us that if you make a pigmented molecule in the same place at the same time as when you are making a material, those pigment molecules get sucked up and are incorporated as part of the material,’ Ellis says. ‘So why can’t we just put the DNA that encodes the enzymes that make a pigment into the same cells that are making the material through genetic engineering?’

To demonstrate that eumelanin production could effectively pigment the cellulose produced by the genetically modified K. rhaeticus, the researchers first grew the bacteria under normal growth conditions for two weeks to produce a cellulose mesh known as a pellicle. They then removed the spent culture media and replaced it with a neutral buffer solution with the reagents required for eumelanin synthesis. After one day of incubation in the development buffer, the cellulose pellicle had turned completely black.

This shoe upper was made by wrapping the treated bacterial cellulose around a foot-shaped mould

The team produced a shoe upper by soaking the material in a glycerol solution to give it the required flexibility, before wrapping it around a foot-shaped mould and allowing it to dry. They also created a wallet prototype from two pressed and dried melanated bacterial cellulose sheets.

‘What was really cool was the colour just doesn’t fade – you can put water on it, scrape it - it’s much more colourfast than we thought we would get,’ Ellis says, adding that the process could, in theory, be adapted to have bacteria grow materials in various vibrant colours and patterns.

‘What we would like to do next is crosslinking – that’s what really makes leather have this nice feel and the ability for it to last 20 years. Crosslinking is normally done by chromium and other very harsh methods so it’d be really nice to find a biological solution to that,’ he adds.

The researchers note that as high yields of the material can be produced from simple static growth cultures, the method should be ‘very amenable to scale-up’.

‘This work is an elegant demonstration of the power of biofabrication and genetic tool kits to map nature’s strategies to develop advanced materials,’ says Theanne Schiros , who works as a materials scientist at both the Fashion Institute of Technology at the State University of New York and Columbia University, both US. ‘It provides important context for exciting opportunities to expand the functionality of emerging biomaterials and future textiles,’ she adds.

K T Walker  et al , Nat. Biotechnol., 2024, DOI: 10.1038/s41587-024-02194-3

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Chemistry articles from across Nature Portfolio

Chemistry is a branch of science that involves the study of the composition, structure and properties of matter. Often known as the central science, it is a creative discipline chiefly concerned with atomic and molecular structure and its change, for instance through chemical reactions.

Automation of air-free synthesis

Cutting-edge chemistry is often performed in non-atmospheric conditions. Continued development of the Chemputer platform now enables the utilization of sensitive compounds in automated synthetic protocols.

• Babak A. Mahjour
• Connor W. Coley

Scalable, high-quality 2D telluride nanosheets for energy and catalysis applications

An innovative solid-state lithiation strategy allows the exfoliation of layered transition-metal tellurides into nanosheets in an unprecedentedly short time, without sacrificing their quality. The observation of physical phenomena typically seen in highly crystalline TMT nanosheets opens the way to their use in applications such as batteries and micro-supercapacitors.

Nanoscale scythe cuts molecular tethers using mechanical forces

Nanoscale systems that release small molecules have potential therapeutic and industrial uses, but can result in low numbers of molecules reaching their target. A release system triggered by mechanical force offers a fresh approach.

• Iwona Nierengarten

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Latest Research and Reviews

Radiolysis of myoglobin concentrated gels by protons: specific changes in secondary structure and production of carbon monoxide

• Nicolas Ludwig
• Catherine Galindo
• Quentin Raffy

Double-walled Al-based MOF with large microporous specific surface area for trace benzene adsorption

Trace benzene poses a risk to the health and safety of humans, resulting in a challenging task. Here authors synthesise double-walled Al-based MOF ZJU-520(Al) with trace benzene adsorption (5.98 mmol g –1 ) and excellent benzene/cyclohexane separation ability.

Embedding biocatalysts in a redox polymer enhances the performance of dye-sensitized photocathodes in bias-free photoelectrochemical water splitting

A robust and efficient dye-sensitized NiO bio-hybrid photocathode based on a redox polymer and [FeFe]- hydrogenase has been developed to couple with a BiVO 4 photoanode for water splitting without applied bias.

• Fangwen Cheng
• Olha Pavliuk
• Haining Tian

Stress-induced ordering evolution of 1D segmented heteronanostructures and their chemical post-transformations

The formation mechanisms for periodic heterostructures are still poorly understood. Here, the authors propose a versatile approach to synthesize one-dimensional segmented heterostructures and reveal a stress-induced ordering mechanism through phase-field simulations.

• Qing-Xia Chen
• Shu-Hong Yu

Use of geopolymers as tunable and sustained silver ion release mediums

• Ilknur Kara

Enhancing photocatalytic H 2 O 2 production with Au co-catalysts through electronic structure modification

Photocatalytic H 2 O 2 production using Au is hindered by its inherently weak O 2 adsorption. Herein, the authors modify the electronic structure of Au with MoS x to form electron deficient Au sites to promote O 2 adsorption and H 2 O 2 production.

• Xidong Zhang

News and Comment

Decomposing data at distance.

The quest for safer nuclear fuels

As researchers explore innovative ways to make nuclear fuels more accident-tolerant, this report investigates the use of manganese ions as dopants for uranium oxide (UO 2 ) fuels.

• S. Olivia Gunther
• Bianca Schacherl

Hidden potential of lithium oxide

One of the major challenges in realizing lithium (Li)-metal batteries is the instability of Li metal in the electrolyte. Now, a study unveils the significant role of lithium oxide in protecting Li metal, thereby contributing to stable battery operation.

• Seongjae Ko
• Atsuo Yamada

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