Bidirectional ion–electric field synergy via in situ grown BiOCl/Bi heterostructure enabling ultra–stable zinc anodes across wide temperatures
Peer-Reviewed Publication
Updates every hour. Last Updated: 25-Dec-2025 19:11 ET (26-Dec-2025 00:11 GMT/UTC)
A semiconductor–metal synergistic interface design via in situ engineering of a Bi/BiOCl heterostructure on Zn anodes was presented. This dual–functional heterointerface enables unprecedented electrochemical performance, including: (i) stable cycling for 2500 h at 10 mA cm–2 in symmetric cells; (ii) 1000 cycles at 10 A g–1 for the Zn@Bi/BiOCl//dibenzo[b,i]thianthrene–5,7,12,14–tetraone (DTT) full battery, and 15,000 cycles at room temperature and 7500 cycles at –20 °C for the Zn@Bi/BiOCl//activated carbon (AC) hybrid ion capacitor (HIC), outperforming most reported AZIBs. This breakthrough originates from a dual–functional synergy: Bi nanoparticles serve as zincophilic nucleation guides to expedite homogeneous Zn2+ deposition, while the BiOCl semiconductor establishes a built–in electric field with Zn to redistribute interfacial ion/charge flux and elevate the hydrogen evolution barrier. This coordinated regulation simultaneously inhibits Zn dendrite formation, HER, and Zn corrosion, imparting promising applications for Zn anodes in AZIBs. Our work not only resolves the long–standing interfacial instability of Zn anodes but also pioneers a semiconductor–metal heterojunction strategy, offering a universal platform for designing dendrite–free metal batteries operable under extreme thermal and rate conditions.
This review explores how viral infections remodel the host cell’s cytoskeleton and membrane systems to form viral replication factories, facilitating viral replication and assembly. These factories come in various shapes, such as viroplasms, spherules, double-membrane vesicles, and tubes, often derived from host organelles like the endoplasmic reticulum and Golgi apparatus.
In recent years, digital agricultural technology extension services (DATES), leveraging Internet platforms such as WeChat official accounts and mobile applications, have gained popularity, providing a new pathway for agricultural technology dissemination. This service overcomes the temporal and spatial limitations of traditional agricultural technology extension, enabling farmers to conveniently access planting knowledge. Then, can DATES effectively encourage farmers to adopt OMF and contribute to the green transformation of agriculture? Professor Minjuan Zhao from the College of Economics and Management, Northwest A&F University, and her team addressed this question through a survey of farmers in major apple - producing areas in China. The related research has been published in Frontiers of Agricultural Science and Engineering (DOI: 10.15302/J-FASE-2024590).
The POINT platform (http://point.gene.ac/) integrates multi-omics biological networks, advanced network topology analysis, deep learning prediction algorithms, and a comprehensive biomedical knowledge graph. It provides a powerful tool to overcome current bottlenecks in network pharmacology and advance the field.
Dynamic multi-robot task allocation (MRTA) requires real-time responsiveness and adaptability to rapidly changing con ditions. Existing methods, primarily based on static data and centralized architectures, often fail in dynamic environments that require decentralized, context-aware decisions. To address these challenges, this paper proposes a novel graph reinforce ment learning (GRL) architecture, named Spatial-Temporal Fusing Reinforcement Learning (STFRL), to address real-time distributed target allocation problems in search and rescue scenarios. The proposed policy network includes an encoder, which employs a Temporal-Spatial Fusing Encoder (TSFE) to extract input features and a decoder uses multi-head attention (MHA) to perform distributed allocation based on the encoder’s output and context. The policy network is trained with the REINFORCEalgorithm.Experimentalcomparisonswithstate-of-the-artbaselinesdemonstratethatSTFRLachievessuperior performance in path cost, inference speed, and scalability, highlighting its robustness and efficiency in complex, dynamic environments.
Investigating structural and hydroxyl group effects in electrooxidation of alcohols to value-added products by solid-acid electrocatalysts is essential for upgrading biomass alcohols. Herein, we report efficient electrocatalytic oxidations of saturated alcohols (C1-C6) to selectively form formate using NiCo hydroxide (NiCo–OH) derived NiCo2O4 solid-acid electrocatalysts with balanced Lewis acid (LASs) and Brønsted acid sites (BASs). Thermal treatment transforms BASs-rich (89.6%) NiCo–OH into NiCo2O4 with nearly equal distribution of LASs (53.1%) and BASs (46.9%) which synergistically promote adsorption and activation of OH− and alcohol molecules for enhanced oxidation activity. In contrast, BASs-enriched NiCo–OH facilitates formation of higher valence metal sites, beneficial for water oxidation. The combined experimental studies and theoretical calculation imply the oxidation ability of C1-C6 alcohols increases as increased number of hydroxyl groups and decreased HOMO–LUMO gaps: methanol (C1) < ethylene glycol (C2) < glycerol (C3) < meso-erythritol (C4) < xylitol (C5) < sorbitol (C6), while the formate selectivity shows the opposite trend from 100 to 80%. This study unveils synergistic roles of LASs and BASs, as well as hydroxyl group effect in electro-upgrading of alcohols using solid-acid electrocatalysts.
In a review published in Molecular Biomedicine, a team of Chinese scientists summarizes the pivotal role of N⁶-methyladenosine (m⁶A)—the most abundant chemical modification in eukaryotic mRNA—in cancer biology. The authors describe how m⁶A regulators (writers, erasers, and readers) influence tumor progression, metastasis, treatment resistance, and the tumor microenvironment. They also discuss emerging therapeutic strategies, including small-molecule inhibitors, RNA-based editing technologies, and combination therapies, highlighting m⁶A's potential as a diagnostic and prognostic biomarker and a target for precision oncology.
Lithium–oxygen (Li–O2) batteries are perceived as a promising breakthrough in sustainable electrochemical energy storage, utilizing ambient air as an energy source, eliminating the need for costly cathode materials, and offering the highest theoretical energy density (~ 3.5 kWh kg–1) among discussed candidates. Contributing to the poor cycle life of currently reported Li–O2 cells is singlet oxygen (1O2) formation, inducing parasitic reactions, degrading key components, and severely deteriorating cell performance. Here, we harness the chirality-induced spin selectivity effect of chiral cobalt oxide nanosheets (Co3O4 NSs) as cathode materials to suppress 1O2 in Li–O2 batteries for the first time. Operando photoluminescence spectroscopy reveals a 3.7-fold and 3.23-fold reduction in 1O2 during discharge and charge, respectively, compared to conventional carbon paper-based cells, consistent with differential electrochemical mass spectrometry results, which indicate a near-theoretical charge-to-O2 ratio (2.04 e−/O2). Density functional theory calculations demonstrate that chirality induces a peak shift near the Fermi level, enhancing Co 3d–O 2p hybridization, stabilizing reaction intermediates, and lowering activation barriers for Li2O2 formation and decomposition. These findings establish a new strategy for improving the stability and energy efficiency of sustainable Li–O2 batteries, abridging the current gap to commercialization.