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A carbon revolution has occurred — carbon atoms can be coaxed into several topologies to make materials with unique properties. Nanotubes are the vanguard of this innovation, and are on the cusp of commercial exploitation as the multifunctional components of the next generation of composite materials.

There is a continuous need for high-temperature coatings that can protect a substrate from oxidation. Here, the use of hexagonal boron nitride ultrathin film as a stable coating on various substrates is reported, which significantly reduces the oxidation of nickel and other metals at temperatures up to 1,100 °C.

Metallic particles are known to etch the surface layers of graphite by catalytic hydrogenation. Here, the authors report the sub-surface etching of graphite by Ni nanoparticles, revealing the formation of networks of tunnels, which are observed microscopically and could be modified for various applications.

Electroreduction of CO₂ into C2 hydrocarbons and liquid fuels is a promising but challenging energy conversion technology, with copper exhibiting fair selectivity for these products. Here, the authors report that N-doped graphene quantum dots can also catalyze the electrochemical reduction of CO₂into multi-carbon hydrocarbons and oxygenates.

Two dimensional materials are promising for electronic applications, which await the exploration of cooperative phenomena. Here, Liu et al. report switchable ferroelectric polarization in thin CuInP₂S₆film at room temperature, demonstrating good memory behaviour with on/off ratio of ∼100 based on two-dimensional ferroelectricity.

While the intrinsic strength of graphene has previously been demonstrated to be high, the fracture toughness remains unknown. Here, the authors perform in situtesting of graphene in a scanning electron microscope and report a critical stress intensity factor of ~4.0 MPa√m.

Devices made up of nanowires offer promise for a range of electronic, photonic and energy applications. Liuet al. fabricate a miniature capacitor by employing a thin layer of Cu₂O as a separator between layers of carbon and copper.

The frictional force required to move a liquid drop on a surface is known to depend upon the drop resting time. N'guessan et al. demonstrate that water drops on graphene surfaces are an exception, which is attributable to the chemical homogeneity and stability of graphene surfaces.

Mimicking the behaviour of biological tissues requires finding biocompatible materials that can strengthen in response to external forces. Agrawal et al. show that polydomain nematic liquid crystal elastomers become unexpectedly stiffer when subjected to a small amplitude and repetitive compression.

When oxygen atoms bind to a graphite surface, they fall into line and make bridges across carbon atoms. This is the spearhead of a chemical attack in which the atomic arrangement of solid carbon is torn apart.

Valley depolarization processes in 2D transition metal dichalcogenides have been linked to acoustic phonons, but optical verification is ambiguous, due to the nearly degenerate acoustic phonon frequencies at the zone-edge. Here, the authors determine the phonon momentum of the longitudinal acoustic (LA) phonons at the K point as responsible for the ultrafast valley depolarization in monolayer MoSe₂.

A synthetic approach is described, for efficiently converting non-van der Waals solids into two-dimensional van der Waals transition-metal chalcogenide layers with specific phases, enabling the high-throughput production of monolayers.

In piezoelectric materials, mechanical strain and electrical polarization are interlinked. Here, the authors find piezoelectricity in carbon nitride nanosheets, arising from the presence of holes in the two-dimensional sheets.

Despite having many similarities with graphene, single-layer boron nitride has a very large bandgap. Now, single-layer hybrids consisting of a blend of domains of boron nitride and graphene have been synthesized. By varying the percentage of boron nitride it is possible to tune the electronic properties, which is a very promising development for potential devices.

Stable, nonvolatile, programmable 2D p–n junctions enable realization of high-performance memories, photovoltaics, logic rectifiers and logic optoelectronic circuits.

Direct coupling between chemical groups on individual nanostructures may lead to new architectures and reactions. Here, the authors report an ambient mechano-chemical reaction between two different reactant carbon nanotube varieties, which produces condensation products and unzipping of the nanotube structure.

The unusual properties of graphene make it a promising candidate for nanoelectronics applications, but it remains a difficult material to make. Now, on the basis of spectroscopic data that characterize the graphene-precursor graphite oxide, researchers have devised an efficient reduction process for the large-scale production of nearly pure, highly conductive graphene sheets.

The potential applications of bacterial cellulose (BC) have been limited by challenges in aligning nanofibrils at the macroscale and creating BC-based multifunctional nanosheets. Here, the authors report a strategy of using shear forces from fluid flow in a rotational culture device to biosynthesize strong BC sheets with aligned nanofibrils, and BC-based multifunctional hybrid nanosheets.

Grain boundaries in polycrystalline graphene are an obstacle to electron transport. However, cunning refinements in growth techniques push the limits to obtain super-sized single-crystal domains.

Metal-organic frameworks are promising for a range of applications, but architectural control is challenging. Here the authors use solvent-assisted ligand exchange to access a variety of metal-organic framework nanomaterials for precursors of nanoporous carbon with sodium ion storage properties.

In 1985, scientists reported the discovery of the cage-like carbon molecule C₆₀. The finding paved the way for materials such as graphene and carbon nanotubes, and was a landmark in the emergence of nanotechnology.

Strong lasing effects similar to those in the optical regime can occur at 1.5–2.1 Å wavelengths during high-intensity XFEL-driven Kα₁ lasing of copper and manganese.

Developing high-productive and energy-saving systems in formate electrosynthesis is attractive but challenging. Here, the authors report an efficient Rh-dispersed In₂O₃ catalyst for CO₂ reduction, benefiting the ampere-level formate coproduction when pairing with anodic aldehyde oxidative dehydrogenation.

It is challenging to maintain the CO selectivity under high current densities in CO₂ electro-reduction process. Here the authors report the synergistic interface between redox active CO₂ organic sorbents and defective Ag catalysts that can enable an ampere level CO₂-to-CO conversion.

The photocatalytic reforming of plastics into value-added chemicals offers a promising strategy to address environmental challenges while providing significant energy benefits. Here, the authors develop modified carbon nitride with enhanced visible light absorption, effectively anchoring under-coordinated IrN₂O₂ sites to catalyze the oxidation of persistent plastic derivatives.

By growing graphene in patterned hexagonal boron nitride layers, planar heterostructures can be fabricated and used to create two-dimensional devices.

A new type of device, the band-to-band tunnel transistor, which has atomically thin molybdenum disulfide as the active channel, operates in a fundamentally different way from a conventional silicon (MOSFET) transistor; it has turn-on characteristics and low-power operation that are better than those of state-of-the-art MOSFETs or any tunnelling transistor reported so far.

All-carbon microscale supercapacitors can be simply and scalably fabricated by the laser patterning and reduction of graphene oxide.

It is demonstrated that graphene coatings do not alter the wetting behaviour of copper, gold or silicon surfaces. Such wetting transparency—shown to occur only for surfaces where surface–water interactions are dominated by van der Waals forces—and graphene’s ability to suppress copper oxidation result in a 30–40% increase in condensation heat transfer on copper. The findings have implications for graphene-based coatings with independently tunable electronic and wetting properties.

Low-density foams offer a number of attractive properties as compared to bulk materials. Here, the authors report a three-dimensional foam structure composed of stacked graphene oxide layers reinforced by hexagonal boron nitride, causing enhanced mechanical integrity.

Large-size monolayer molybdenum disulfide (MoS₂) has recently been produced via chemical vapour deposition (CVD), yet its structures and physical properties are yet to be fully explored. Here, the authors study the growth-induced strain in CVD-grown MoS₂ and strain-based bandgap engineering of MoS₂.

Understanding dendrite formation is key to advancing high-energy-density and safe metallic lithium batteries. With the help of cryogenic electron microscopy, heat is now suggested to play a crucial role in stabilizing lithium metal electrodes by suppressing dendrite growth.

Thermal effects on batteries, both due to external variations and internal fluctuations, significantly impact their performance. Ajayan and colleagues survey recent advances in understanding the thermal effects on individual battery components.

Scale formation may have detrimental effects on the properties and functions of materials’ surfaces. Here the authors report the high scaling resistance of hexagonal boron nitride and relate it to the atomic level structure and interaction with water molecules.

A hexagonal boron nitride nanocoating grown directly on a stainless-steel mesh enables ultrahigh power input intensity in an electrothermal membrane distillation system to desalinate hypersaline solutions with exceptionally high water flux, single-pass water recovery and heat utilization efficiency.

A 3D-printing technique has been developed to create high-quality pure silica nanostructures with sub-200 nm resolution and the flexible capability of rare-earth element doping. It shows excellent application potential in three-dimensional micro- and nanophotonics.

The ever-increasing applications for Li-ion batteries in markets call for environmentally friendly and energy-efficient recycling technologies. Here the authors report using a deep eutectic solvent to extract valuable components of Li-ion batteries.

A new non-van der Waals 2D material hematene, exfoliated from natural iron ore hematite, shows ferromagnetic ordering and enhanced photocatalytic activity.

Supramolecular mixed matrix materials containing amorphous MOFs are carbonized to form hierarchically nanoporous carbon membranes, and the single metal atoms and clusters enhance H₂ separation properties for H₂ production, delivery, and recovery.