Unlike other data intensive domains, understanding distributions, trends, correlations, and relationships in materials data sets typically involves navigating high-dimensional spaces with only a limited number of observations. Under these conditions extracting structure/property relationships is not straightforward and considerable attention must be given to the reduction of feature space before predictions can be made. Here we have used Kohonen networks (self-organizing maps) to identify hidden structure/property relationships in computational sets of twinned and single-crystal diamond nanoparticles based on structural similarity in multiple dimensions, and confirmed the importance of a limited number of surface chemical features using regression.

The authors carried out matched experiments and molecular dynamics simulations of the compression of nanopillars prepared from Cu|Au nanolaminates with up to 25 nm layer thickness. The stress–strain behaviors obtained from both techniques are in excellent agreement. Variation in the layer thickness reveals an increase in the strength with a decreasing layer thickness. Pillars fail through the formation of shear bands whose nucleation they trace back to the existence of surface flaws. This combined approach demonstrates the crucial role of contact geometry in controlling the deformation mode and suggests that modulus-matched nanolaminates should be able to suppress strain localization while maintaining controllable strength.

Here we present the synthesis of porous platinum–palladium macrobeams templated from high aspect ratio Magnus’ salt needle derivatives. The combination of [PtCl4]2− and/or [PdCl4]2− with [Pt(NH3)4]2+ ions results in salt needles ranging from 15 to 300 µm in length. Electrochemical reduction of the salt templates results in porous macrobeams with a square cross-section. Porous side wall texture and elemental composition was controlled with initial platinum to palladium salt ratio. Macrobeam free-standing films exhibited a specific capacitance up to 11.73 F/g and a solvent accessible surface area of 26.6 m2/g. These salt-templated porous platinum–palladium macrobeams offer a promising material for fuel cell catalysis.

Excitation of surface waves on conducting materials provides a near resistance-free interface capable of a material glissade either by plasmon forces or by optical beam tractors. Analogous to an ice hockey rink, as proof-of-principle plasmon-assisted optical traction, or hoovering, of water drops on a gold surface is demonstrated. Changes in the contact angle provide a novel, low-cost nanoscale method of quantifying observable and potentially tunable changes. Variability in thresholds and movement, including jumps, is observed and can be explained by the presence of significant roughness, measured by scanning electron microscopy, with water tension. The demonstration opens a path to directly integrate various optical and plasmonic traction technologies. Implications of the phenomena and ways of improving transport and potential applications spanning configurable microfluidics, antennas, tunable lenses, diagnostics, sensing, and active Kerr and other devices are discussed.

Luminescent oxygen sensor composed of platinum-porphyrin and a gas-permeable polymer binder was applied as an optical crack sensor paint for infrastructure. The sensor paints were designed as a three-layered structure in which the luminescent oxygen sensor layer was sandwiched between oxygen barrier layers. The sensor paints emitted intense luminescence under UV light irradiation, and the luminescence was efficiently quenched when a new crack formed on the concrete surface. Microcracks, which were <0.1 mm width and hardly visible to the naked eye, were clearly visualized under UV light irradiation due to the luminescent quenching caused by oxygen diffusion.

Synthesis of ZIF with zinc, cobalt, or copper was carried out by microwaves. The effect of metal center on morphologies and pores of products was studied. Nitrogen adsorption/desorption onto ZIFs was examined by density functional theory. The micro, meso, and macropores of ZIF-8, Zn/Co-ZIF-8, and Cu/ZIF-8 ranged 99.814–99.969%, 0.055–0%, and 0.031–0.130%, respectively. Average pore sizes of ZIF-8, Zn/Co-ZIF-8, and Cu/ZIF-8 are 1.291, 1.194, and 1.164 nm, respectively. Monolayer saturation limits of nitrogen onto ZIF-8, Zn/Co-ZIF-8, and Cu/ZIF-8 were 21.152, 18.943, and 17.784 mmol/g, respectively. Further, the results included densities, total surface areas, total pore volumes, and average particle sizes of ZIF-8, Zn/Co-ZIF-8, and Cu/ZIF-8.

Hollow mesoporous polydopamine (HMPDA) microcapsules were prepared by a template method using silica nanoparticles as the templates. The template method was also used for the formation of mesoporous polydopamine (PDA), which is driven by π–π interactions of trimethylbenzene and PDA, in which the PDA wall with mesoporous structure can be obtained after template removal by extraction. Because of its surface mesoporous structure and large central cavity structure, HMPDA microcapsules have unique adsorption properties. Compared with other porous materials, PDA has better biosafety because dopamine itself is a bionic material. The above properties are of great significance for the application of HMPDA microcapsules in the field of biologic medicine, especially in drug carriers.

Bimodal nanoporous platinum (BNP-Pt) is synthesized by using a sacrificial nanoporous copper (NP-Cu) support for oxygen-reduction-reaction (ORR) catalysts in fuel cells. The specific ORR catalytic activity of BNP-Pt increases by the dissolution and removal of supporting NP-Cu, suggesting that the BNP structure improves the intrinsic catalytic properties of platinum. The lattice contraction of BNP-Pt containing residual copper even after NP-Cu removal is milder than predicted by Vegard's law. The BNP structure governs the intrinsic catalytic activity of the platinum by relaxing the lattice contraction and by alloying with copper and/or misfit strain at the Pt/Cu interface.

A process for bioconjugation of an IgG antibody and silicon quantum dots (Si-QDs) having the luminescence in the near-infrared (NIR) range was developed. For the bioconjugation, the surface of water-soluble all-inorganic Si-QDs was functionalized by using silane-coupling agents. In amino-functionalized Si-QDs, successful conjugation was achieved without strongly affecting the luminescence property. Detailed analyses revealed that Si-QDs are bound covalently to both the light and heavy chains of an IgG antibody. It was also confirmed that the binding property of an IgG antibody with antigen nucleoprotein was not ruined by the process. The successful conjugation of an IgG antibody and NIR luminescent Si-QDs paves the way for designing environmentally friendly bio-sensing and -imaging processes.

To identify new face centered cubic high entropy alloys (HEAs), MnFeCoNiCu thin film samples were prepared by simultaneous magnetron sputtering of elements onto Si wafers. This sputtering arrangement yielded compositional gradients in the samples. The films exhibited regions with different phases, some of which were single-phase and non-equiatomic. To screen the crystal structure and composition across film samples, multiple characterization techniques were used: scanning electron microscopy, focused ion beam, energy-dispersive x-ray spectroscopy, x-ray diffraction, and electron backscattered diffraction analysis. Using this combinatorial method, candidate single-phase HEAs were identified and then successfully arc-melted in bulk form, followed by thermomechanical processing.

A broadband magnetoelectric energy harvester, consisting of Fe1−xGax (Galfenol) as the magnetostrictor and a relaxor ferroelectric single crystal as the piezoelectric, has been designed and optimized. Finite element analysis (FEA) has been employed to show that either a linear displacement or a 180° rotation of a magnet is sufficient to achieve maximum stroke from the Galfenol rod, which induces a rhombohedral to orthorhombic phase transition in Pb(In1/2Nb1/2)O3–Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O3–PbTiO3 that produces a large jump in voltage. A rotational design based on a pendulum with an unbalanced mass was fabricated and used to confirm the validity of our FEA model.

The third-order nonlinear optical (NLO) susceptibility for morphologically controlled polydiacetylene (PDA) nanocrystals (NCs) and PDA nanofibers (NFs) have been determined for the first time by the experimental combination of transient pump-probe spectroscopy and spectroscopic ellipsometry. The figure of the merit of PDA NFs was much superior to PDA NCs and/or PDA bulk crystals, and the excitonic relaxation time was of order of sub-pico second. Namely, this is the first case to reveal the morphological effect on NLO response. PDA NFs having the long effective π-conjugation length are one of the most promising organic third-order NLO nanomaterials toward the photonic device application.

In this work, the effect of temperature, in the range of 25 to 250 °C, on deformation twinning in textured polycrystalline pure magnesium (Mg) was investigated. Compression loading was applied perpendicular to the c-axis texture direction. The yield strength and strain hardening rate are shown to drastically decrease with increasing temperature with total suppression of twinning at 200 °C. This behavior is attributed to the decrease in the critical resolved shear stress for prismatic slip and temperature insensitivity of tensile twinning. These results provide a first step in fundamentally understanding the deformation of Mg at elevated temperatures and quantify the mechanisms that lead to their improved formability at elevated temperatures.

Indentation and scratch models are proposed to numerically investigate effects of compressive prestress on film's mechanical responses. In indentation, normal stress distributions are strongly dependent on film thickness; the applied force and the maximum normal stresses with a prestress are much larger than without prestress. For various film thicknesses the change in the normal force in scratch between the non-prestressed and prestressed films is 4%–23%. The scratch friction coefficient is larger with prestress than without prestress. With biaxial or uniaxial prestress the material becomes more difficult to deform or to slide at the contact surface compared with cases without prestress.

In this work, the guest Li+ conduction properties in NaBr–LiBH4 system were investigated. It was suggested that the guest Li+ ions occupy the Na+ sites and BH4− ions substitute the Br− ions in NaBr. The dominant Li+ conduction in NaBr–LiBH4 system was demonstrated by the combination of electrochemical measurements and time-of-flight secondary ion mass spectrometry. The guest Li+ ion conductivity of 15NaBr·LiBH4 was measured to be 1 × 10−7 S/cm at 313 K. The present results indicate that the guest Li+ conductors are not restricted to the previous reported iodides (NaI, KI), but other Li-free compounds have the possibility to become the candidates for the guest Li+ ion conductors.

The regeneration of human tissues with complex anatomy such as gastrointestinal (GI) tract remains greatly challenging since it requires appropriate cell microenvironments with well-defined structural and biochemical cues. In this investigation, bilayer scaffolds consisting of different polymer nanofibers with orthogonal fiber orientations were prepared, in which vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF) and platelet-derived growth factor (PDGF) were encapsulated separately. The bilayer scaffolds have similar architecture to the anatomy of the GI tract and can achieve dual releases of VEGF and PDGF in sequential and sustained manners, which hold promise as appropriate cell microenvironments for promoting the regeneration of the GI tract.

The relationship between the oscillatory force and the depth-response during dynamic indentation was analyzed mathematically and investigated experimentally in ultrafine-grained Al–Zn alloys processed by high-pressure torsion. We have shown for the first time that the phase shift between the local oscillatory force and depth signal, caused by the internal friction, is correlated to the strain-rate sensitivity, which is a key parameter indicating the ductility of materials. This correlation enables a new application of dynamic nanoindentation for studying the rate-dependent deformation-mechanisms of materials from a novel aspect.

This paper reports the molecular organization and mechanical properties of electrospun, post-drawn polyacrylonitrile (PAN) nanofibers. Without post-drawing, the polymer chain was kinked and oriented in hexagonal crystalline structures. Immediate post-drawing in the semi-solid state disrupted the crystal structures and chain kink at maximum draw ratio. Structural re-orientation at maximum draw resulted in a 500% increase in Young's modulus and a 100% increase in ultimate tensile strength. By applying post-drawing to electrospinning it may be possible to obtain PAN fibers and PAN-derived carbon fibers with enhanced mechanical properties compared to available fabrication technologies.

The influence of Ag-doping on the crystallographic structure, magnetic properties, and magnetocaloric effects of Mn1−xAgxCoGe (0.01 ⩽ x ⩽ 0.10) is reported. A transformation of crystal structure from orthorhombic to hexagonal was observed at room temperature. Doping Ag in Mn sites results in a first-order magnetostructural transition near room temperature. A Curie-temperature window of 90 K was obtained between the Curie temperatures of the austenite (Ni2In-type) and martensite (TiNiSi-type) phases. Large magnetic entropy change values of ~22.0 and 9.4 J/kg/K, and refrigerant capacity of 308 and 272 J/kg, were found for x = 0.06 and 0.05, respectively, for μ0ΔH = 5 T.