Targeted drug delivery directly to the liver has unlocked major breakthroughs across medicine, but constructing the chemical key to enter liver cells remains complex and costly. Researchers have now introduced a nature-inspired, mobile delivery platform utilizing polyrotaxanes—supramolecular thread-like polymers where ring-shaped cyclodextrin molecules can freely rotate and slide along a central axle chain, effectively bypassing traditional synthetic bottlenecks.

Ammonia is essential for fertilizers and is emerging as a zero‑carbon energy carrier, but its industrial production via the Haber‑Bosch process is energy‑intensive and emits large amounts of CO₂. Meanwhile, nitrate pollution from agriculture and industry has contaminated groundwater worldwide, threatening ecosystems and human health. Electrocatalytic nitrate reduction to ammonia (NO₃RR) offers an elegant solution: using renewable electricity to convert nitrate waste into valuable ammonia.

Randomness is the foundation of quantum mechanics. However, existing theories do not explain its origin. In this paper, a hypothesis is proposed that the phase of the wave function is the sole source of randomness in quantum mechanics. The proposed theory can serve as a basis for the creation of quantum artificial intelligence on a fundamentally new basis.

Hyperbolic phonon polaritons (HPhPs) are hybrid light–matter waves that can confine infrared electromagnetic fields to spatial scales far below the corresponding free-space wavelength. Controlling HPhPs on femtosecond timescales could provide a foundation for future ultrafast and ultracompact nanophotonic devices. However, directly imaging such ultrafast dynamics has remained challenging because HPhPs are strongly dispersive and their wavelength changes markedly with frequency. Broadband femtosecond laser pulses therefore excite HPhPs over a range of wavelengths, causing their interference patterns to overlap and wash out in real-space images. In this study, researchers developed an ultrafast infrared near-field optical microscopy technique that combines nanoscale spatial resolution and an approximately 150-femtosecond temporal resolution with a spectral resolution of about 10 cm⁻¹. By using a diffraction grating to spectrally resolve the light scattered from the microscope tip before detection, the technique enables frequency-selective imaging without sacrificing ultrafast time resolution. Applying the new technique to a van der Waals heterostructure composed of tungsten disulfide (WS₂) and hexagonal boron nitride (hBN), the researchers revealed how photoexcited charge carriers generated in WS₂ transiently modulate HPhPs propagating in the adjacent hBN. The researchers observed changes in the HPhP electric-field amplitude and, in structures containing a relatively thick WS₂ layer, a change in the HPhP wavelength. The researchers say, “The results establish a new platform for observing and controlling nanoscale light propagation on femtosecond timescales, opening new opportunities for ultrafast nanophotonics”.

POSTECH research team develops a highly directional speaker by integrating metamaterials with a single ultrasonic transducer.

Instead of producing graphene at temperatures as high as 900°C, researchers at Tohoku University found a way to lower this to 300 °C. Even better, the material used to achieve this can be easily obtained from industrial waste.

A new way to imprint complex surfaces on low-cost, sustainable polymers could be used in a wide range of industries, including for water-repellent coatings, optical devices and data storage discs.

The complex nano- and micro-scale patterns on sulfur-derived polymers, unveiled this week in the American Chemical Society ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces journal, build on a wide range of green chemistry solutions led by Flinders University. 

Professor Qilong Shen's research group at the Shanghai Institute of Organic Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, developed an extremely mild and efficient new synthetic strategy. Under transition metal-free conditions, various α-heteroaryl amides and esters can be constructed in high yields simply by mixing zinc powder, α-bromoamides (or esters), and heteroaryl halides at room temperature. This not only greatly simplifies the reaction process but also provides a practical and green new method for the synthesis of related drug molecules and their skeletons. The article was published as an open access Research Article in CCS Chemistry, the flagship journal of the Chinese Chemical Society.