Rare glassy metal discovered during quest to improve battery performance

Materials scientists studying recharging fundamentals made an astonishing discovery that could open the door to better batteries, faster catalysts and other materials science leaps.

Ferried across: Figuring out unconventional spin transport in quantum spin liquids

Scientists uncover the peculiar mechanism by which spin perturbations travel through a seemingly unpassable region of a quantum spin liquid system. This new insight may represent another building block in next-generation electronics and even quantum computers.

Origami metamaterials show reversible auxeticity combined with deformation recoverability

Findings open up possibilities for mechanical metamaterials to be used in soft robotics and medical devices.

Study: Mapping crystal shapes could fast-track 2D materials

Materials scientists are calling for a collective, global effort to fast-track the mass production of 2D materials like graphene and molybdenum disulfide.

Self-healing soft material outsmarts nature

A soft material that heals itself instantaneously is now reality. A team of scientists tune the nanostructure of a new stretchable material in such a way that it now entirely recovers its structure and properties at the blink of an eye after being cut or poked.

Small but self-imposing: Titanium alters behavior of host lattice atoms

Researchers have combined optical and acoustic approaches and found that incorporating titanium atoms into barium hexaferrite leads to an unexpected substructure forming in the crystal lattice. The resulting material is promising for ultrafast computer memory applications.

Novel drug delivery nanoparticles use neurotransmitters as a 'passport' into the brain

Researchers create neurotransmitter-lipid hybrids that help ferry therapeutic drugs and gene editing proteins across the blood-brain barrier in mice.

Scientists publish seminal study into impact of nanoparticles on living species

The study assessed how the guts of species could protect against the bioaccumulation and toxicological effects of engineered nanomaterials.

Taking the guesswork out of twistronics

New model explores the design space of twisted 2D materials.

Water molecules are gold for nanocatalysis

Water molecules play an active role in facilitating the oxygen dissociation needed for the oxidation reaction.

Novel technique moves microparticles using electric fields

Theoretical studies have suggested that 'particle density', or the number of particles in an area, can be utilized to develop a novel ratchet transportation with a 'static' electrical field.

Heat smarter, not harder - how microwaves make catalytic reactions more efficient

Scientists demonstrate a synchrotron X-ray spectroscopy-based method by which the local temperatures of metal nanoparticles can be measured under microwaves.

Magnetic nanoparticles change their magnetic structure in a magnetic field

When ultrafine magnetic particles are exposed to an external magnetic field, their magnetic core grows in a previously unexpected way.

Trapping tiny particles: A versatile tool for nanomanipulation

Researchers overcame the natural restrictions by developing optical tweezers based on metamaterials - a synthetic material with specific properties that do not occur naturally. This was the first time that this kind of metamaterial had been used for single nanoparticle trapping.