Journal of Materials Chemistry Blog

A chameleon cloth that changes colour in response a drop in oxygen concentration could be used to warn of oxygen deficient areas say Chinese scientists.

The colour of the cloth gradually changes from red to purple to blue as the oxygen concentration increases. The light, soft and flexible cotton cloth could be easily included in clothes to make wearable sensors the team say.

Read the full paper for free until 8^th December:

Xu-dong Wang, Ting-yao Zhou, Xin-hong Song, Yaqi Jiang, Chaoyong James Yang and Xi Chen, J. Mater. Chem., 2011, 21, 17651-17653

This paper was also featured in Chemistry World.

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Researchers combined silver nanoparticles and iron oxide to make nanoparticles with Ag@Fe2O3 yolk–shell structure. After functionalization of the surface with glucose, these magnetic nanoparticles show high capture efficiency of bacteria and potent antibacterial activity because of Ag cores. Interested to know more? Read the article for free until 7^th December (free registration required)

Multifunctional Ag@Fe2O3 yolk–shell nanoparticles for simultaneous capture, kill, and removal of pathogen: Zhanhua Wei, Zijian Zhou, Meng Yang, Chenghong Lin, Zhenghuan Zhao, Dengtong Huang, Zhong Chen and Jinhao Gao, J. Mater. Chem., 2011, 21, 16344-16348

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A soft porous crystal which changes its fluorescence in response to mechanical grinding and heat has been developed by scientists in China. 

Applying mechanical force changes the organic crystal’s fluorescence from yellow through to cherry red. Heating the crystal reverses this. The team say this mechanofluorochromism is caused by the crystal going through multiple structural transformations.

Read the full paper for free until 5^th December:

Construction of soft porous crystal with silole derivative: strategy of framework design, multiple structural transformability and mechanofluorochromism: J. Mei, J. Wang, A. Qin, H. Zhao, W. Yuan, Z. Zhao, H. H. Y. Sung, C. Deng, S. Zhang, I. D. Williams, J. Z. Sun and B. Z. Tang, J. Mater. Chem., 2011, Advance Article, DOI: 10.1039/C1JM12673C

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A hybrid photonic crystal made from an inverse crystalline silicon opal doped with germanium nanocrystals has been created by scientists in Japan and Canada. This is the first demonstration of ncGe doped into the photonic lattice of i-cSi-o. 

The team behind the research say the synergistic effects of i-ncGe-cSi-o materials could find use of in optoelectronic and photovoltaic applications.

Interested to know more? Read the full article for free until 30th November: Makoto Seino, Eric J. Henderson, Daniel P. Puzzo, Naoki Kadota and Geoffrey A. Ozin, J. Mater. Chem., 2011, 21, 15895-15898

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A one-step process for mask-free wet etching of hard and flexible Indium Tin Oxide substrates at the micron scale has been developed by scientists in France. The process is quick and provides an inexpensive way to create patterns with micrometre-size insulating areas without altering the electrical and optical properties of the entire substrate the team say.

The method developed by Julienne Charlier and co-workers uses the probe of a scanning electrochemical microscope to generate a micrometric source of oxidizing agents in an aqueous acid solution. This electrochemical wet-lithographic process preserves the electrical and optical properties of the un-etched part of the remaining ITO film.

Read the article for free until 29^th November:

Scanning electrochemical microscopy as an etching tool for ITO patterning: Federico Grisotto, Roamin Métayé, Bruno Jousselme, Bernard Geffroy, Serge Palacin and Julienne Charlier, J. Mater. Chem., 2011, 21, 15962-15968

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Chinese scientists have investigated the optical and electronic contributions to efficiency improvements in polymer solar cells with Au nanoparticles. 

The absorption enhancement due to incorporation of Au NPs is insignificant and provides only a minor contribution to power conversion efficiency improvement. This is due to the lateral distribution feature of the strong near-field of plasmonic resonance around the metallic NPs. The results should also apply to other metallic NPs such as Ag and Pt included in organic thin film solar cells.

The team say that that it is necessary to account for near-field physics in order to provide a full picture for the effective optical design of photovoltaics. (J. Mater. Chem., 2011, DOI: 10.1039/C1JM12820E)

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Self-assembled nanofibers that respond to external stimuli have been created by scientists at Seoul National University, South Korea.

The nanofibers undergo a reversible chiral–nonchiral transition triggered by heating or changes in solvent polarity. The supramolecular chirality of the nanofibers is caused by a conformational change of hydrophobic aromatic rods and reduction in the hydrodynamic volume of the ethylene oxide chains. Read the article for free until 21st November:

Zhegang Huang, Seong-Kyun Kang and Myongsoo Lee, J. Mater. Chem., 2011, DOI: 10.1039/C1JM12683K

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Replicating single butterfly wing scales with ZrO₂ can create building blocks for small complex photonic devices say UK and Chinese scientists.

In this hot paper the team uses individual single wing scales from the tropical butterfly M. didius as bio-templates to synthesis 3D ZrO₂ photonic crystals.  The optical properties can be tuned by controlling the lattice size during replication. The teams says that the vast number of species of moths and butterflies, each with several different type of wing scale with different morphologies, offer a wide variety of bio-templates to create complicated photonic crystals with desirable properties via this approach.  

Read the article for free until 11th November: Yu Chen, Jiajun Gu, Di Zhang, Shenmin Zhu, Huilan Su, Xiaobin Hu, Chuanliang Feng, Wang Zhang, Qinglei Liu and Andrew R. Parker, J. Mater. Chem., 2011, 21, 15237-15243  

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A core–multisheath SiC–SiO2–BN nanocable has been fabricated by a team of scientists at Harbin Institute of Technology, China. The team led by Guangwu Wen say the nanocable could potentially be used as a blue and ultraviolet emitter in harsh and demanding environments.

Novel coaxial SiC–SiO2–BN nanocable: large-scale synthesis, formation mechanism and photoluminescence property: Bo Zhong, Liang Song, Xiaoxiao Huang, Xiaodong Zhang, Guangwu Wen and Yu Zhou, J . Mater. Chem., 2011, 21, 14432-14440

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UV-induced fluorescence recovery and solubility modulation of photocaged conjugated oligomers: A series of conjugated oligomers that show both increased fluorescence efficiency and pH-dependant solubility upon UV irradiation have been designed by a team at Tufts University, USA. The team behind the research say this approach is effective at tuning the properties of conjugated organics with light after traditional synthetic operations, and has potential for use in photoactivatable fluorophores or solution-processable multilayer devices. (J. Mater. Chem., 2011, 21, 14041-14047)

Direct write tethered protein arrays: Protein arrays can be written directly onto a protein resistant surface. This approach eliminates the need for additional back-filling steps. The team behind the research say their method can tolerate a broad range of process conditions which allows the retention of proteins’ biological functionality. (J. Mater. Chem., 2011, 21, 14072-14078)

Atomic layer deposition of metal fluorides through oxide chemistry: This hot article describes the deposition of metal fluoride thin films by an atomic layer deposition process using ozone based chemistry. The team say that using hexafluoroacetylacetonate as a fluorine source increased the purity of the films by reducing the oxygen content. (J. Mater. Chem., 2011, 21, 14461-14465)

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