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When manufacturing techniques transform metals, ceramics or composites into technologically useful forms, understanding the mechanism of the phase transformation process is critical to shaping the behavior of these high-performance materials. However, seeing the transformation in real time is indeed difficult. A new study in the journal Nature, led by Professor Guangwen Zhou of the Thomas J. Watson College of Engineering and Applied Science’s Department of Mechanical Engineering and the Materials Science program at Binghamton University, uses a transmission electron microscope (TEM) to peer into the oxide. -to-metal transformation at the atomic level. Of particular interest are mismatch dislocations which are always present at the interface in multiphase materials and play a key role in determining structural and functional properties. Students Zhou, Xianhu Sun and Dongxiang Wu are the first co-authors of this paper (“Kinetics of dislocation-induced interfacial transformation”)...

figure: This image depicts the formation of the second layer in a heterolayer coordination nanosheet. The cobalt ions pass through a pre-existing first layer (consisting of the iron coordination center and the pyridine ligand), which has formed at the liquid-liquid interface between water and dichloromethane. They then assemble into a coordinated layer by combining with the pyridine ligand. see again Credit: Hiroshi Nishihara of Tokyo University of Science The last few decades have witnessed a large amount of research in the field of two-dimensional (2D) materials. True to its name, this thin-film-like material consists of layers only a few atoms thick. Many chemical and physical properties of 2D materials can be adjusted, leading to promising applications in many fields, including optoelectronics, catalysis, renewable energy, and more. Coordination nanosheets are one of the most interesting types of 2D materials. “Coord...

The last few decades have witnessed a large amount of research in the field of two-dimensional (2D) materials. True to its name, this thin-film-like material consists of layers only a few atoms thick. Many chemical and physical properties of 2D materials can be adjusted, leading to promising applications in many fields, including optoelectronics, catalysis, renewable energy, and more. Coordination nanosheets are one of the most interesting types of 2D materials. “Coordination” refers to the effect of metal ions in these molecules, which act as coordination centers. These centers can spontaneously create organized molecular dispositions that span multiple layers in 2D materials. It has attracted the attention of materials scientists because of its beneficial properties. In fact, we are just beginning to scratch the surface of what heterolayer coordination nanosheets — coordination nanosheets whose layers have different atomic compositions — can offer. In a recent study ...

Producing biomaterials that match the performance of cartilage and tendons has been a elusive goal for scientists, but new materials created at Cornell represent a promising new approach to mimic natural tissue. The results are published July 8 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, and provide a new strategy for synthesizing clinical solutions for damaged tissue. The tissue must be soft enough to bend and flex, but durable enough to withstand prolonged loads – for example, the loads that the knee tendons have to support. When tissues are worn or damaged, collagen hydrogels and synthetic materials have the potential to serve as substitutes, but they do not have the right combination of biological and mechanical properties of natural tissues. Now, Cornell researchers have engineered a biohybrid composite material with essential characteristics of natural tissue. It consists of two main ingredients: collagen – which provides softness and biocompatibility to the materia...

4×5 inch film made of 10 layers of high performance dielectric elastomer (PHDE) which can be processed and stacked together with 20 actuators. Credit: Software Research Lab/UCLA UCLA materials scientists and colleagues at the non-profit scientific research institute SRI International have developed new materials and manufacturing processes to create artificial muscles that are stronger and more flexible than their biological counterparts. “Creating artificial muscles to allow work and detect force and touch has been one of the great challenges of science and engineering,” said Qibing Pei, professor of materials science and engineering at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering and correspondent author of a recently published study in Science . For a soft material to be considered for use as an artificial muscle, it must be capable of generating mechanical energy and still be able to withstand high strain conditions—meaning that it...

Diagram of a semiconductor nanowire made of indium, gallium, and nitrogen—decorated with gold and chromium oxide nanoparticles. When light hits the nanowire, it liberates electrons and positively charged “holes” that the electrons leave behind. In the nanowires themselves, the holes oxidize water to protons (hydrogen) and oxygen. Meanwhile, some of the electrons are drawn into the metal nanoparticles, where they break down the carbon dioxide. The molecules recombine into carbon monoxide, hydrogen and methane molecules to form syngas. Credit: Roksana Rashid, McGill University. Solar-powered synthesis gas can recycle carbon dioxide into useful fuels and chemicals, an international research team has shown. “If we can produce syngas from carbon dioxide using only solar energy, we can use this as a precursor for methanol and other chemicals and fuels. This will significantly reduce the overall CO. 2 emissions,” said Ze...