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Nature’s redox enzymes inspire the design of catalysts with precise spatial control. Here, the authors report stable metal-free bicarbenium catalysts that form biradicals for highly selective oxygen and nitric oxide reduction, revealing a blueprint for open-shell electrocatalysis.

The ability to resist compaction has widespread implications for reverse osmosis (RO) membrane technology. Here the authors present a class of thin-film crosslinked composite reverse osmosis membranes that resist physical compaction at ultrahigh pressures.

A [2]catenane comprising two intertwined aromatic (34π) octaphyrinoid rings with entangled magnetic shielding interactions is synthesized. Upon four-electron oxidation, the system converts to a tetracation with two globally antiaromatic (32π) rings, in which through-space bonding interactions diminish the antiaromatic destabilization. Counterions can also affect the (anti)aromaticity of the tetracations.

In 1972, Erich Clar envisioned Clar’s goblet, a polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbon featuring two unpaired electrons that are spin-paired. However, synthesizing it in a solution phase remains challenging. Now a derivative of Clar’s goblet has been prepared in solution, and spin entanglement at the molecular scale has been demonstrated experimentally.

Non-planar nanographenes are materials with promising prospects for chiroptical and optoelectronic applications. Now bilayer molecular nanographenes composed of two hexa-peri-haxabenzocoronene units linked by a spirocycle have been synthesized. Modulation of the electronic properties of one of the benzocoronene units enables an electron-transfer process between the donor and acceptor moieties, leading to the formation of zwitterionic open-shell bilayer spironanographenes.

The synthesis of topological molecular carbons with persistent chirality is challenging. Here, a triply twisted Möbius carbon nanobelt was synthesized and its two enantiomers were isolated, showing a large absorption dissymmetry factor.

Poor mechanical stability under high humidity remains a critical challenge for flexible perovskite solar cells. Here, the authors develop a bioinspired dopamine containing polymer to enhance adhesion in humid environments, achieving an efficiency of nearly 26%.

Atomically precise graphene fragments are synthesized by using a radical-mediated coupling approach. One open-shell doublet graphene fragment forms a persistent bilayer assembly with highly delocalized 32-centre-2-electron pancake bonding.

Analysis of the bracteatus pineapple genome provides insight into fiber production, color formation, sugar accumulation and fruit maturation. Resequencing of 89 Ananas genomes supports the coexistence of sexual recombination and a ‘one-step operation’ during domestication.

A chemist-intuited atomic robotic probe is developed that enables autonomous site-selective manipulation of magnetic nanographenes with atomic precision and aids in reaction mechanism elucidation through the incorporation of learned knowledge and artificial intelligence, leading to the intelligent synthesis of these materials.

Molecular tessellations of complex tilings are difficult to design and construct. Here, the authors show that molecular tessellations can be formed from a single building block that gives rise to two distinct supramolecular phases, whose self-similar subdomains serve as tiles in the periodic tessellations.

The design of open-shell nanographenes is commonly limited to systems featuring a single magnetic origin. Now a strategy that combines topological frustration and electron–electron interactions has been developed to generate a butterfly-shaped nanographene that hosts four highly entangled π-spins and exhibits both ferromagnetic and anti-ferromagnetic coupling.

The mechanistic details of entangled triplet pair formation in organic materials have been debated over the past decade. Now, the concept of coherent triplet pair formation is revived using a library of pentacene derivatives, invoking charge resonance mixing as a material design principle for harnessing the effect.

Chemically synthesized graphene nanosheets offer device design flexibility and improved optoelectronic performance. Here, the authors report solution-processed distributed feedback lasers with graphene nanosheets as active media having linewidths < 0.13 nm, long operational lifetimes and low thresholds.

Encoding functionalities in covalent organic frameworks (COFs) is important for widening their application field but the development of fluorescent COFs is hampered by a lack of guiding design principles. Here the authors demonstrate tuning and switching of the photoluminescence in 2D COFs made of non-emissive building blocks.

Yinghao Sun and colleagues report a genome-wide association study for prostate cancer in Han Chinese men. They identify two new risk-associated loci at chromosomes 9q31 and 19q13.

The understanding of how a singlet exciton separates into triplet states in organic semiconductors is crucial to the design of efficient organic solar cells. Here, Lukmanet al. identify the role played by charge-transfer states during triplet formation through side-group engineering of pentacenes.

Creating atomically-precise quantum architectures with high digital fidelity and desired quantum states is an important goal for quantum technology applications. Here the authors devise an on-surface synthetic protocol to construct atomically-precise covalently linked organic quantum corrals with the formation of a series of new quantum resonance states.

Ultrafast photo-induced processes in complex systems require theoretical models and their experimental validation which are still lacking. Here the authors investigate singlet fission in a pentacene dimer by a combined experimental and theoretical approach providing a real-time visualisation of the process.

A conjugated diradicaloid cage has been synthesized and its aromaticity was investigated. The neutral compound and the dication have dominant monocyclic conjugation pathways and both are aromatic (the former following Hückel’s rule and the latter Baird’s rule). The tetracation ([6n + 4] π-electrons) exhibits global 3D antiaromaticity whereas the hexacation ([6n + 2] π-electrons) exhibits global 3D aromaticity and has high D₃ symmetry.

Engineering a coupling between magnetic molecules and conducting materials at room temperature could help the development of spintronic devices. Loh et al. show that the spin state of QDTP molecules deposited on graphene and MoS₂ couples to their electronic structure, affecting magnetotransport.