Reviews & Analysis

This Review summarizes the use of topological modes to enable compact laser architectures, alongside emerging research directions involving non-Hermitian band topology, non-linear gain dynamics and quasiperiodic ordering.

This Review surveys wireless energy conversion, a paradigm that transforms wirelessly transmitted power directly into chemical, thermal, optical or mechanical energy without intermediate storage. It covers transmission mechanisms, conversion pathways from charging to motoring, and engineering trade-offs, before identifying routes towards standardized, secure and scalable deployment.

Long-haul large-capacity 400G optical transmission over 1,500 km is possible through advanced fibre-optic systems. This Review provides a holistic view of the signal modulation, spectrum plans, optical components and optical-layer infrastructure necessary to achieve those networks.

Metalenses face both remarkable opportunities and challenges as they evolve from laboratory prototypes to practical devices. This Review highlights how advances in advanced materials, scalable manufacturing and academic–industrial synergy can transform these challenges into opportunities for the widespread implementation of metalens technologies.

Heterogeneous integration is essential to advances in artificial intelligence, high-performance computing and mobile technologies. This Perspective outlines the emerging technology and challenges necessary to revise the technology roadmap to shape the future evolution of semiconductor systems and computing architectures.

This Review examines how artificial intelligence (AI) systems optimize energy and information networks independently, then coordinate renewable energy supply with traffic demand across both. This Review also assesses the carbon emissions of AI systems from their training, deployment and use, and hardware life cycle, outlining strategies to ensure the environmental benefits of AI systems outweigh their costs.

Silicon carbide power devices offer advantages over silicon, but realizing these advantages requires tailored packaging and integration strategies. This Review examines packaging materials, packaging technologies and electro-thermal co-design strategies that address the challenges of high-speed switching, concentrated heat flux and high-temperature and high-voltage operation.

Professors at Kyung Hee University connect artificial intelligence, communications and quantum science with clinical and industrial partners. In this Viewpoint, four professors discuss how uniting intelligence initiatives with trauma centres in healthcare, quantum computing and 6G technologies improves predictive models for patient outcomes.

Research at the Department of Battery Engineering at Hanyang University focuses on lithium-ion and next-generation battery technologies. In this Viewpoint, two professors discuss how strong industry–university partnerships enable the department to offer practical research opportunities and specialized education to nurture battery experts, bridging cutting-edge academic research and real-world industrial applications.

The transition to low-carbon energy resources necessitates resilient power grids capable of handling low-inertia system dynamics. This Perspective proposes an Internet-inspired power system set-up composed of independent, asynchronous compartments able to balance energy across the entire grid.

Emerging bioelectronic technologies enable real-time monitoring and precise modulation of plant physiology and environmental conditions. These technologies have the potential to accelerate basic plant science research and transform sustainable agriculture.

This Review provides a holistic view of sustainable gas, liquid and solid insulating materials, focusing on substitution, benign degradation, recycling, reuse and resource conversion to support net zero power systems.

This Perspective examines the potential of large language models (LLMs) in sixth-generation radiocommunications (6G) networks, highlighting cloud LLM fundamentals, telecom-specific adaptations, edge-device implementation techniques and multi-agent deployments.

Indium selenides, InSe and In₂Se₃, exhibit high electron mobility, high thermal velocity, thickness-tunable bandgaps and unique phase-dependent ferroelectric properties. Addressing their challenges of scalable synthesis, phase control and oxidation could be the basis for next-generation, low-power computing.

Decommissioned power semiconductor devices often still have useful life, creating opportunities to reuse rather than discard them. This Perspective outlines how careful screening and creative upcycling, including artificial intelligence-assisted assessment and circuit reconstruction, can extend device lifetimes while reducing waste and supporting a circular and lower carbon power electronics industry.

Transistors, the foundation of modern electronics, are typically rigid, planar and 2D, which limits their integration with soft, irregular, 3D biological systems. This Perspective highlights the rise of hydrogel transistors in overcoming these challenges and how they provide an unprecedented opportunity for next-generation 3D, programmable and living bioelectronics.

The Internet of Bodies, an evolution of the Internet of Things, involves devices that interact intimately with the human body. Organic electrochemical transistors are well suited for these applications owing to their integrated sensing–memory–computing functions as well as high biocompatibility.

Interconnect architectures are vital frameworks that allow disparate components, such as cores and memory, to communicate. This Review provides an overview of the development of key interconnect components, such as metals, diffusion barriers and intermetal dielectrics, and how they can offer more efficient and sustainable performance.

Active-matrix digital microfluidics (AM-DMF) presents a highly scalable and programmable platform for handling microscale liquid samples. Wang et al. describe advances in AM-DMF chip design, circuit optimization and functional integration and discuss its considerable commercial potential for automated high-throughput biomedical sample manipulation.

Information security remains a vital concern for communications technology, and quantum key distribution may offer the highest security theoretically possible. This Review discusses the performance limitations, high costs and practical security concerns for quantum key distribution to scale to a global level.