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A fundamentally different approach to designing solid oxide electrolytes is presented, using a phase transition to suppress electronic conduction in a correlated perovskite nickelate; this yields ionic conductivity comparable to the best-performing solid electrolytes in the same temperature range.

Application of an electric field changes the transport and optical properties of samarium nickelate submerged in water, making it a suitable passive sensor of weak electric fields in salt water.

Functional materials that act as bio-sensing media when interfaced with complex bio-matter are attractive for health sciences and bio-engineering. Here, the authors report room temperature enzyme-mediated spontaneous hydrogen transfer between a perovskite quantum material and glucose reactions.

Erbium ions offer a way to integrate light emitters into silicon electronics, but their radiative decay time is too slow for effective light modulation. Here, the authors use phase changes in vanadium dioxide to enable all-optical modulation more than a thousand times faster than the erbium excited-state lifetime.

Hydrogen-doping driven metal to ferroelectric phase transition in a complex oxide NdNiO₃ is demonstrated. Transient negative differential capacitance and implementation of polarization decay into neural network for learning are then presented.

Heat facilitates electrical resistance switching in Mott insulators and can synergistically enhance neuromorphic computing.

A single component built from sputtered niobium dioxide, a Mott insulator–metal transition material, can simultaneously exhibit both visible light emission and electrical threshold switching with neuron-like oscillations.

Achieving high ionic conductivity at close to room temperature in solid oxide electrolytes is challenging due to the large thermal activation needed for ion transport. Now, a hydrogen-intercalated brownmillerite oxide, SrCoO_2.5, has been shown to function as a high-performance proton conducting electrolyte for fuel cells below 200°C.

Designing energy efficient and scalable artificial networks for neuromorphic computing remains a challenge. Here, the authors demonstrate tree-like conductance states at room temperature in strongly correlated perovskite nickelates by modulating proton distribution under high speed electric pulses.

Ultrathin large-area solid-oxide membranes can be fabricated using lithographically patterned metallic grids and used to make fuel cells that operate at relatively low temperatures.

Bad metals, such as the copper oxide superconductors, do conduct electricity but the origin of their poor conductivity is unclear. A study of disordered rare-earth nickelates now provides microscopic insights into bad-metal behaviour

Habituation is a learning mechanism that enables control over forgetting and learning. Zuo, Panda et al., demonstrate adaptive synaptic plasticity in SmNiO₃ perovskites to address catastrophic forgetting in a dynamic learning environment via hydrogen-induced electron localization.

Probabilistic computing demands low power and high quality random number generation. Woo et al. demonstrate the use of a spin crossover in LaCoO3 to generate random numbers that outperform software-generated random numbers in probabilistic computing.

An electrically tunable device that can work as an optical switch, an optical limiter with a tunable limiting threshold and a nonlinear optical isolator with a tunable operating range in the mid-infrared range is realized by combining a gold layer with subwavelength square slits and a layer of VO₂.

The function of materials that have been coated with an ionic liquid can be altered by applying an electric field to shuttle ions in and out. The technique has been used to make materials that have switchable properties. See Letter p.124

Neuromorphic memory devices are modelled on biological design and open up new possibilities in computing. Here, the authors report the use of a nickelate as a channel material in a three-terminal device, controllable by varying stoichiometry in situvia ionic liquid gating.

Orbital occupancy by electrons has a large effect on electronic properties of correlated oxides. Here, the authors report a chemical doping strategy of a perovskite nickelate, leading to the observation of a new insulating phase and a reversible resistivity modulation greater than eight orders of magnitude.

Phonon polaritons in anisotropic van der Waals materials enable subwavelength confinement and controllable flow of light at the nanoscale. Here, the authors exploit correlated perovskite oxide (SmNiO₃) substrates with tunable conductivity to obtain real-time modulation and nanoscale reconfiguration of hyperbolic polaritons in hBN and α-MoO₃ crystals.

Suppressing the degradation of polymer electrolyte membrane fuel cells due to anode side-reactions during repetitive cell start-up/shut-down remains a formidable challenge. Now, a phase transition material of WO₃ has been explored as a smart catalytic switch to enable highly selective electrocatalysis and improve fuel cell longevity.