Themed collection Recent Review Articles

Recent advances in understanding photocarrier dynamics of fullerenes in PSCs, focusing on charge transport, interfacial interactions, and the impact of functionalized derivatives on efficiency and stability.

MXenes are 2D materials with high conductivity and tunable surfaces, ideal for energy storage and flexible electronics.

This review integrates theoretical and computational advances to identify active sites and key intermediates in NO_x electroreduction, offering mechanistic insights and guiding principles for selective ammonia synthesis.

This review discusses key factors influencing photoluminescence fluctuations of single perovskite nanocrystals and highlights surface passivation strategies to enhance their stability.

This review highlights the therapeutic potential of metal-based and metal oxide nanoparticles in IVDD by leveraging their antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, and microenvironment-modulating properties to enhance tissue repair. The ToC was created in BioRender. Zhang, L. (2025) https://BioRender.com/6fzdcqv.

This review highlights iron-based nanozymes including iron oxides, single-atom nanozymes, and MOFs that induce ferroptosis via ROS generation and Fenton chemistry, achieved by POD-, CAT-, OXD- and SOD-like activities.

This review highlights recent stimulus-responsive antimicrobial nanotherapeutics for ocular infections, focusing on their design, progress, and advantages/limitations.

Mechanisms of graphene growth via chemical vapor deposition on oxide ceramics such as Al₂O₃, MgO, CaO, and SiO₂ are discussed, with a focus on substrate-specific methane activation processes, toward versatile three-dimensional graphene synthesis.

This review systematically compiles studies on redox reactions during SLFP regeneration, which are crucial for enhancing the understanding the regeneration of SLFP batteries.

This review focuses on the recent application progress of polymer additives in liquid electrolytes for lithium batteries.

This review highlights the recent progress in structural engineering of noble metal-based nanozymes and their enzyme-like properties in various enzyme-mimicking reactions and diverse biomedical applications.

This review explores the spin effects in both achiral and chiral metal halide perovskites and their opto-spintronic applications.

This review explores advancements, applications, challenges, and future prospects of flexible fibrous electrodes for implantable biosensing, highlighting their potential in biomedical monitoring and human–machine interfaces. Images reproduced with permission, full details in paper.

The ion-selective transport property of biological systems has inspired the development of biomimetic ion channels. This mini-review highlights the mechanisms, recent fabrication strategies and applications of biomimetic ion channels.

This review emphasizes the groundbreaking potential of MXene-based microrobots in developing targeted drug delivery and synergistic therapeutic approaches.

Cu-based bimetallic catalysts show enhanced electrochemical CO₂ reduction performance via the tandem effect. This review traces their progress, highlighting design advances, mechanisms, and challenges to guide efficient CO₂ conversion.

This review explores the development of biomedical nanomaterials based on rod-shaped plant viruses, providing insights into the design of innovative biomaterials for applications related to drug delivery, bioimaging and immune-therapy. Created in https://BioRender.com.

Hydrogen bubble evolution presents both challenges and opportunities in Zn-based batteries. While bubble evolution induces electrode instability and dendrite formation, it can also optimize mass transfer through controlled fluid dynamics.

Polymeric nanoparticles represent an innovative approach to drug delivery, particularly for addressing complex diseases like cancer.

External strategies such as electrode design, stress/heat transfer improvements, microstructure optimization, and multifunctional synergy show great potential for improving sensing performance of PVDF-based sensors. Images reproduced with permission, full details in paper.

The increasing demand for sustainable solutions to address environmental and energy challenges has driven the development of advanced materials. This paper highlights recent advancements in the development of sustainable nanofibrous membranes.

Multifunctional coupling and signal decoupling achieved through nanostructure and supramolecule design, enable multimodal mechanoluminescent materials to play an increasingly important role in interdisciplinary applications and cutting-edge fields.

DNA nanomaterials offer promising advancements in addressing the challenges of rheumatoid arthritis (RA) through targeted drug delivery, biomarker detection, and therapeutic innovation.

Laser diodes based on solution-processed semiconductor quantum dots (QDs) present an economical and color-tunable alternative to traditional epitaxial lasers.

The dual role of ROS in liver diseases, and the potential of nanomaterials with catalytic activity for therapeutic applications are examined.

This review provides a comprehensive overview of recent biomedical applications of upconversion nanomaterials specifically within the near-infrared two-region (NIR-II) window (1000–1700 nm).

Mathematically inspired structure design has emerged as a powerful approach for tailoring material properties, especially in nanoscale thermal transport, with promising applications both within this field and beyond.

The emerging integrated power supplies for self-powered bioelectronic devices over the past few years are summarized. Additionally, the challenges and future perspectives in self-powered device design and manufacturing are also indicated.

Lithium metal is considered one of the most promising anode materials for lithium batteries due to its high theoretical specific capacity (3860 mA h g⁻¹) and low redox potential (−3.04 V).

This minireview highlights recent progress in BHJ-based photoelectrochemical cells and photocatalysts for solar-to-chemical conversions.

Chiral nanomaterials are emerging as a promising class of vaccine adjuvants with the potential to significantly enhance vaccine efficacy, especially in the context of cancer immunotherapy.

Dilute and single-atom alloy catalysts have attracted tremendous attention in heterogeneous catalysis. Herein, we discuss recent progress on simulating their stability and catalytic behavior.

We summarize the latest developments in NIR-CPL generated by chiral inorganic nanomaterials and provide new perspectives for constructing NIR-CPL materials and developing new applications for chiral nanomaterials.

Solid-state nanochannel sensors consisting of recognition elements and nanochannels are capable of detecting a wide range of small molecules including gas molecules, drug molecules and biomolecules.

This mini-review focuses on how super-resolution techniques uncover the detailed interactions between nanoparticles and immune cells.

Chirality is an intriguing property of molecules, and exciting area of study involves the generation of chirality in nanographenes (NGs), also known as graphene quantum dots.

The arene–perfluoroarene force enables coassemblies with pronounced optical properties, which provide protocols for fabricating chiroptical materials.

MXene QDs are illustrated, showcasing their synthesis, properties, and emerging applications in next-generation diagnostics and environmental monitoring.

Biomimetic nanomaterials (0D, 1D, and 2D nanomaterials) for the functional design and applications of double-network conductive hydrogels. Images adapted from Servier Medical Art (https://smart.servier.com/), licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).

This review summarizes the unique role of novel gallium-based nano-liquid metals in antibacterial applications, focusing on their distinctive activities and underlying antibacterial mechanisms. The graphical abstract was created in BioRender. R, z. (2025) https://BioRender.com/v96z429.

Polymersomes offer tuneable membrane and release traits, with mobility and ability to traverse barriers, making them a promising ocular delivery alternative. Images adapted from Servier Medical Art (https://smart.servier.com/), licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)

An overview of progress in computational nanocatalysis, including methods for modelling nanoparticle catalysis and computational analysis of their structure and catalytic activity.

Cardiovascular disease (CVD) remains one of the leading causes of high mortality and morbidity worldwide, posing a substantial threat to global health.

We summarize recent advances in the theranostics of cardiovascular and cerebrovascular diseases using carbon dots (CDs), and introduce the specific application performance of CDs.

This review provides a comparative overview of thin-film temperature sensors based on five major material groups, highlighting their mechanisms, strengths, limitations, and integration into wearable, e-skin, and robotic applications.

This review summarizes advancements in flexible pressure sensor design, including materials, devices, algorithm design, and systems, using bibliometric methods. The materials used in the system section are sourced from Vecteezy (Vecteezy.com).

3D cell cultures produce higher EV yields, with comparable or more physiologically relevant morphology, enriched cargo, and enhanced functionality. However, each model presents distinct strengths and limitations that must be carefully considered.

DNA-PAINT applications are guiding new advancements in a virtuous cycle that benefits bioimaging and nanometrology.

Schematic diagram of electrohydrodynamic printing of various structures and its applications in sensor fabrication. Images reproduced with permission, full details in paper.

This review sheds light on the primary representation of fluctuation-induced forces, the Casimir effect, both in its classical (critical) and quantum expressions, highighting their role on the development of nanoscale devices.

This review summarizes the recent advances of GQD-based memristors mainly in terms of GQD features, memristive mechanisms, and application fields, thereby providing insights for the development and design of GQD-based memristors.

The peculiar properties of low-dimensional inorganic lead halide perovskite materials have triggered the attention of researchers in the past decade. Variation of bandgap energy with the number of layers of the perovskite nanoplatelet.

This review summarizes the latest progress in the field of SERS, including advanced substrate materials and their enhancement mechanisms, with an emphasis on metal cluster-based SERS probes and their biomedical applications.

This review systematically summarizes the electronic band structures, optical properties and device applications of 2D anisotropic semiconductors.

Environmental applications of metal and metal oxide nanoparticles primarily comprise contaminant adsorbents, catalysts, and sensors for hazardous substances, etc.

This review outlines the chemical toolkit for energy-dissipating sacrificial bonds by surveying recent (post-2017) developments in tough, impact-resistant soft materials.

This review comprehensively explores the biological effects of hydrogen, hydrogen release mechanisms, synthesis methods, and biomedical applications of hydrogen-releasing metal-based micro/nanomaterials.

This review summarizes the optimization strategies for the HILs in QLEDs, focusing on the design of single HILs, dual HILs, and doped HILs. Additionally, treatment methods that can further optimize the interfacial properties are discussed.

An overview of the characterization techniques for probing charge storage mechanisms of 2D and thin-layered materials as electrodes in electrochemical energy storage systems.

2D materials, including graphene, boron nitride (BN), and MXene, have attracted wide attention in microwave absorption due to their unique lamellar structure, large specific surface area, low density, and good thermal and chemical stability.

MOFs are promising NH₃ adsorbent candidates due to their highly tunable structure and functionality, which can precisely match the characteristics required for NH₃ adsorbents in multiple application scenarios.

This review critically compares wet chemical and plasma polymerization methods for polymeric nanoparticle synthesis, highlighting plasma polymerization as a dry, scalable platform with insights into clinical translation and commercialization.

This review offers a thorough and authoritative overview of research advancements in the field of ionic liquid-based electrolytes with an emphasis on Li-ion batteries and supercapacitors.