Reviews & Analysis

The combination of topological properties and magnetic order can lead to new quantum states and exotic physical phenomena. In particular, the coupling between topological insulators and antiferromagnets enables magnetic and electronic structural engineering.

The thermal conductivities of superatom crystals have significant contributions from extended phonon states and show a remarkable temperature dependence due to orientational ordering.

Ultra-stable and catalytic platinum atoms and clusters have been obtained by entrapment within a zeolite framework during its formation.

One of the most salient features of hybrid lead halide perovskites is the extended lifetime of their photogenerated charge carriers. This property has now been shown experimentally to originate from a slow, thermally activated recombination process.

Stretching elastic membranes over curved substrates can be used to guide and control crack paths.

A miniaturized camera has been developed by integrating a planar metasurface lens doublet with a CMOS image sensor. The metasurface lens doublet corrects the monochromatic aberration and thus delivers nearly diffraction-limited image quality over a wide field of view.

Oxide interfaces with tunable spin–orbit coupling provide an ideal environment to achieve highly efficient conversion of spin currents into charge currents.

A first-order phase transition between two crystalline phases of magnetic whirls sheds light on the role of topology in magnetic transitions.

In the past decade, artificial materials with unusual wave interactions have significantly evolved and matured. In honour of the tenth anniversary of the premiere metamaterials conference, we look at the directions in which this field is evolving, and its impact on technology.

Two independent studies provide insight on the formation of nanocrystal superlattices and their atomic alignment using real-time in situ X-ray scattering techniques.

Forces applied to the cell surface induce stretching of the chromatin in the nucleus and a rapid increase in gene expression.

A single transport function has been developed to describe the temperature and energy dependence of charge transport in insulating, semiconducting and metallic polymers.

The half-Heusler GdPtBi is found to show transport and calorimetric signatures of the existence of Weyl fermions under the application of a magnetic field. The half-Heusler alloys form a big family of tunable compounds that may substantially enlarge the number of Weyl semimetals known.

Confocal microscopy and computational analysis, now used for measuring microscale stresses in colloidal crystals, could be developed for investigation of amorphous materials, crystal melting, and mechanical properties of tissues.

Self-propelled Janus particles with externally regulated anisotropic interactions can be made to swarm, cluster and form slithering chains.

Computer networks, trained with data from delayed-fluorescence materials that have been successfully used in organic light-emitting diodes, facilitate the high-speed prediction of good emitters for display and lighting applications.