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Microneedles reverse photoaging wrinkles. In this study, a magnesium galvanic cell bipolar microneedle composed of redox reaction is introduced. Through playing the role of antioxidant, anti-inflammatory, cell migration, angiogenesis and so on, it can combine action of hydrogen, magnesium ion and micro-current to repair the damage caused by ultraviolet radiation and rejuvenate the skin.

Abstract

Excessive exposure to ultraviolet (UV) radiation is a major factor in the development of skin photoaging wrinkles. While current treatments can slow the progression of photoaging, it is very difficult to achieve complete reversal. This study introduces galvanic cell microneedle (GCMN) patches with magnesium-containing bipolar electrodes. These patches operate through a galvanic cell mechanism, generating microcurrents and releasing hydrogen gas and magnesium ions via a redox reaction. The combination of hydrogen's antioxidant and anti-inflammatory properties, microcurrent-induced stimulation of cell migration, and magnesium's promotion of angiogenesis and macrophage M2 anti-inflammatory polarization synergistically works to reverse photoaging wrinkles and rejuvenate the skin. Furthermore, this work examines how GCMNs may influence the transforming growth factor-β/Smad (TGF-β/Smad) pathway. This approach shows promise for advancing research and development in the field of medical cosmetology.

N-doped CoTe2 composites, incorporating 3D low-tortuosity tunneling structure, self-catalytic N─Co bonds, and heterojunction, have been successfully fabricated to accelerate the catalytic conversion of potassium polytellurides. Benefiting from the synergistic effects of unique architecture and superior conversion kinetics, the composites deliver an ultralong-lifespan potassium storage performance over 25 000 cycles with an ultra-low capacity decay rate of only 0.0019%.

Abstract

Transition metal tellurides (TMTes) are promising anodes for potassium-ion batteries (PIBs) due to their high theoretical specific capacity and impressive electronic conductivity. Nevertheless, TMTes suffer from persistent capacity degradation due to the large volume expansion, high ion-diffusion energy barriers, and the dissolution/shuttle of potassium polytellurides (K x Te y ). Herein, a heterostructured CoTe2 composite equipped with a self-catalytic center (N-CoTe2/LTTC) is developed, exploiting its low-tortuosity tunneling, chemical tunability, and self-catalytic properties to elevate cycling stability to new heights. Systematic experiments have verified that the elaborate N-CoTe2/LTTC provides a short-range and efficient electron/ion transport path, accelerates K+ diffusion kinetics, and suppresses huge volume distortion. Notably, the N─Co bonds self-catalytic center can promote the adsorption capabilities and accelerate the conversion kinetics for K x Te y under the synergistic effect of heterojunction. Consequently, the optimized N-CoTe2/LTTC electrode delivers an ultralong‑lifespan cyclability (over 25 000 cycles at 2.0 A g−1, only 0.0019% capacity decay rate per cycle), outperforming those of reported Te-based anodes. Finally, the N-CoTe2/LTTC//PTCDA@450 full cell manifests impressive stability (over 4300 cycles at 2.0 A g−1). This work uncovers the impact of catalytic centers on the conversion of K x Te y and provides valuable insights for rationally designing ultralong-lifespan TMTes anodes for PIBs.

This review provides a comprehensive overview of the latest advances in biological lasers and their applications, discusses the construction of gain materials for biological lasers, and compares carbon dots (CDs) in detail, highlighting the advantages of CDs, with the aim of enhancing understanding of CD lasers and contributing to injecting new vitality into the field of biological lasers.

Abstract

Biological lasers, representing innovative miniaturized laser technology, hold immense potential in the fields of biological imaging, detection, sensing, and medical treatment. However, the reported gain media for biological lasers encounter several challenges complex preparation procedures, high cost, toxicity concerns, limited biocompatibility, and stability issues along with poor processability and tunability. These drawbacks have impeded the sustainable development of biological lasers. Carbon dots (CDs), as a novel solution-processable gain materials characterized by facile preparation, low cost, low toxicity, excellent biocompatibility, high stability, easy modification, and luminescence tuning capabilities along with outstanding luminescence performance. Consequently, they find extensive applications in diverse fields such as biology, sensing, photoelectricity, and lasers. Henceforth, they are particularly suitable for constructing biological lasers. This paper provides a comprehensive review on the classification and application of existing biological lasers while emphasizing the advantages of CDs compared to other gain media. Furthermore, it presents the latest progress made by utilizing CDs as gain media and forecasts both promising prospects and potential challenges for biological lasers based on CDs. This study aims to enhance understanding of CD lasers and foster advancements in the field of biological lasers.

A novel surface spraying technique enhances evaporation materials, boosting solar-driven evaporation rates by 297% versus controls with broad substrate compatibility. Its nanogel spray featuring nanoconfined pores facilitates water-cluster formation and diffusion, reducing evaporation enthalpy to advance seawater desalination technologies.

Abstract

Accelerating water evaporation is vital for processes like photosynthesis, dehydration, and desalination. Optimizing the pore structure and interfacial properties of evaporative materials can reduce evaporation enthalpy and increase efficiency. However, integrating the evaporation interface with water transport channels poses significant design challenges and complicates low-enthalpy evaporation analysis. To address these challenges, a hydrophilic nanovesicle gel is developed with a hydrophobic mesoporous structure as an ideal spray. This spray effectively upgrades their interface of universal substrates (including PVA hydrogels, balsa wood, nanofiltration membrane, cellulose paper, nylon fabrics, etc.), enabling the simple preparation of evaporation materials. The sprayed samples, at a low spraying dose of 40 mg cm−2, achieved evaporation rates of 1.58 and 3.26 kg m−2 h−1 under 0.5 and 1 sun irradiance, which are 297% and 268% higher than their respective substrates. These nanogels offer benefits like edibility, low cost, ease of use, and compatibility with various substrates, showing great potential in seawater desalination, dehydration technology, crop yield enhancement, and coating/paint drying. More importantly, this work highlights the need for researchers to focus on the surface structure of materials, rather than merely using bulk gels, in the development of high-performance evaporative materials.

In this study, the development of soft, biocompatible liquid metal electrodes (LMe) for high-resolution, long-term electromyography recording is done. In human and in vivo animal trials, LMe captures continuous neuromuscular signals of the muscle, evaluating the efficacy of rehabilitative drugs for muscle trauma. This work enables improved diagnostics and drug modeling for muscle disorders using a soft device interface.

Abstract

Electromyography (EMG) is a widely used diagnostic technique for evaluating the electrical activity of muscles and their controlling nerves. However, conventional surface electrodes with planar structures often suffer from low spatial resolution and suboptimal signal quality. Here, 3D-shaped, substrate-free, soft, and biocompatible liquid metal electrodes (LMe) are presented as a wearable interface for neuromuscular signal recording. These electrodes enable the acquisition of high-quality EMG signals while their intrinsic mechanical softness supports long-term use in clinical settings. In a human pilot study, continuous, high-spatial-resolution EMG monitoring of musculoskeletal activity over 25 days is achieved. Furthermore, in vivo EMG monitoring in mouse models of ischemia and volumetric muscle loss demonstrated the therapeutic effects of extracellular muscle-rehabilitative drugs. This work highlights the potential of LMe for advanced drug screening and long-term clinical diagnostics.

To achieve synergistic therapy of diabetic wounds, morphologically switchable Au nanowires (ANW) and resveratrol-hemoglobin (HR) nanoparticles are co-loaded into the microneedles. The morphologically adaptable ANW continuously consumes glucose, while HR improves hypoxia, scavenges reactive oxygen species, and inhibits the differentiation of M1-type macrophages. This work thus realizes the long-term management of glucose during synergistic diabetic wound healing therapy.

Abstract

Diabetic wounds are a common complication of diabetes and pose a significant threat to human health. High glucose concentration in the wound remains a major obstacle, necessitating effective strategies to achieve sustained glucose consumption for synergistic diabetic wound therapy. In this study, an Au-based nanomaterial is developed that can adjust its morphology in different therapeutic processes. The prepared Au nanowire (ANW) can be converted into Au nanospheres (AS) under ultrasonic conditions by adjusting the amount of polyethylene glycol (PEG) on its surface for convenient delivery. Intriguingly, AS is depolymerized into ANW again in the wound area, prolonging the retention time, and ensuring continuous consumption of glucose. After constructing the morphologically switchable Au nanowire, a polyvinyl alcohol (PVA) is applied it to microneedle and co-delivered it with hemoglobin (Hb)-resveratrol (RES) nanoparticles for synergistic diabetic wound therapy. In a streptozotocin (STZ)-induced diabetic mouse model, the microneedle degraded gradually, and the Hb-RES nanoparticles synergistically ameliorated hypoxia, scavenged ROS, and inhibited macrophage differentiation into pro-inflammatory M1 phenotypes. During this process, ANW continuously catalyzed glucose through its inherent glucose oxidase activity. Thus, this study provides novel insights into the long-term management of glucose concentration during synergistic diabetic wound healing.

Herein, an innovative technology is presented that will transform current monolithic and heterogeneous integration by using BEOL-compatible fluidic-assisted self-alignment transfer and integration process. Multi-dimensional integration of III-N optical and electronic devices over 2D materials on CMOS is demonstrated with no epitaxial constraints or different process thermal budgets.

Abstract

Advances in semiconductor technology have been primarily driven by exponentially reducing the size of silicon transistors and pushing the quantum limit. However, continued scaling becomes extremely difficult in accordance with Moore's law. Conversely, recent advances in monolithic and heterogeneous integration by exploring non-group IV materials envision beyond CMOS scaling. This study entails the development of scalable van der Waals (vdW) integration technology by using all CMOS back-end-of-line-compatible processes: vertical 3D and lateral 2D integration of III-N devices, 2D materials (graphene and molybdenum disulfide), and CMOS. Advanced fluidic-assisted self-alignment transfer (FAST) provides a process accuracy of ≈ 32.6 nm as analyzed on a 200 mm wafer scale. The freestanding III-N chips are vdW integrated onto 2D materials, and the vdW interfaced multi-layer graphene successfully functioned as a back-gating interconnect line. Moreover, fidelity of the vdW interface is confirmed by conducting systematic yield, uniformity, and reliability analysis. The unique fourfold rotationally symmetric design of GaN transistors makes them compatible with massive and random FAST processing. GaN-based radio-frequency power and cascode GaN/Si transistors are integrated on silicon-on-insulator-CMOS. The proposed approach affords a remarkable advantage by surpassing the physical limits and facilitating functional diversification, thus advancing the concept of “More than Moore.”

The Heisenberg algebra of a vector space and Hochschild homology

In arXiv:2105.13334, Gyenge, Koppensteiner and Logvinenko constructed a 2-categorification of the Heisenberg algebra of any (possibly noncommutative) smooth projective variety, and decategorified it via Grothendieck group. In this talk, I will first give an overview of our 2-categorification and then explain how to decategorify it via the Hochschild homology HH_*, instead. Effectively, this means extending the decategorification map from a lattice in HH_0 to the whole Hochschild homology. The payoff is a direct generalisation to any smooth projective variety of Grojnowski and Nakajima’s original Heisenberg algebra action on the cohomology of Hilbert schemes of points on a surface.

• Speaker: Timothy Logvinenko, University of Cardiff
• Wednesday 30 April 2025, 14:15-15:15
• Venue: CMS MR13.
• Series: Algebraic Geometry Seminar; organiser: Mark Gross.

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Energy Environ. Sci., 2025, Accepted Manuscript
DOI: 10.1039/D4EE05866F, PaperShaojie Zhang, Zhongpeng Li, Yixin Zhang Zhang, Xuanpeng Wang, Pei-Yang Dong, Saihai Lei, Weihao Zeng, Juan Wang, Xiaobin Liao, Xingye Chen, Dongqi Li, Shichun Mu
Solvation chemistry is crucial for gel polymer electrolytes (GPEs) due to great impact on ionic conductivity and solid electrolyte interface (SEI) properties. However, its rational regulation to balance fast Li⁺...
The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry

Nature Energy, Published online: 11 March 2025; doi:10.1038/s41560-025-01729-5

New research finds that a randomized energy audit intervention reduced metal processing firms’ unit cost of electricity by 8%, primarily by informing managers that they were overpaying for electricity, and had an insignificant net effect on electricity use and associated greenhouse gas emissions.

Nature Nanotechnology, Published online: 11 March 2025; doi:10.1038/s41565-025-01872-w

Double-gate transistors of bilayer layered antiferromagnet CrPS4 give full control of the spin polarization of the conduction band and of the magnetization of the accumulated electrons.

Energy Environ. Sci., 2025, Accepted Manuscript
DOI: 10.1039/D5EE00380F, PaperSen Yin, Xuanang Luo, Fushen Tang, Zhihui Xiong, Youran Lin, Wenyu Yang, Yuanyuan Shu, Yang Wang, Lei Ying
Polymer hole transport layer plays a critical role in inverted perovskite solar cells since they can determine stability and photovoltaic performances of devices. However, conventional polymer hole transport materials, such...
The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry

Energy Environ. Sci., 2025, Accepted Manuscript
DOI: 10.1039/D4EE04787G, Paper Open Access &nbsp This article is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 3.0 Unported Licence.Inwoo Kim, Hyunjae Kim, Seongha An, Jihoon Oh, Minsoo Kim, Jang Wook Choi
Reliable battery management requires the degradation of lithium-ion batteries (LIBs) under variable usage patterns to be accurately and continuously monitored and predicted. However, the chemically entangled internal states and the...
The content of this RSS Feed (c) The Royal Society of Chemistry

The Ignite Guide: How your mentor will work with you

Interested in applying for our Ignite programme 6-11 July 2025? Join us for an informative webinar on 12 March which will provide you with more information on the mentoring at Ignite.

The Ignite Guide: How your mentor will work with you

Date: Wednesday 12 March, 12:00-13:00 GMT

Venue: Online via Microsoft Teams

Register: Please complete the online form to book your place

This webinar is designed to give you an idea of what the tailored mentor support is like at our Ignite programme and how you, as a mentee, can build a good relationship with your mentor and work to get the best from the mentoring process. We explain what mentors look for and how you can get a head start at Ignite by knowing this in advance.

During the intense Ignite week, your assigned mentor helps you work on identifying your customer and competitive advantage, enabling you to design your business model and develop your financial strategy in preparation for investment. All this and your mentor will help you wrap it up in a pitch deck for different stakeholders – a great takeaway as you establish and grow your venture.

Chaired by Ann Davidson, Head of Practice at Cambridge Judge Entrepreneurship Centre

Guest speaker: Sarah Mardle, CEO and Founder of Alma Business Consulting, and seasoned coach and mentor.

We aim to provide you with the advice, tips and inspiration you need to maximise your experience of the Ignite programme.

The talk is followed by 10 minutes of Q&A to give participants an opportunity to ask questions.

This is a must attend event for those looking to apply to the Ignite 2025 programme from 6 – 11 July at Cambridge Judge Business School. We hope you will join us and look forward to seeing you there.

Please share this event with your networks or community…

Have a query? Email ignite@jbs.cam.ac.uk

Find out more and apply for Ignite > https://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/entrepreneurship/programmes/ignite/

• Speaker: Sarah Mardle, CEO and Founder of Alma Business Consulting
• Wednesday 12 March 2025, 12:00-13:00
• Venue: Online.
• Series: Entrepreneurship Centre at Cambridge Judge Business School; organiser: ignite.

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Towards Global-scale Species Distribution Modelling

Abstract

Estimating the geographical range of a species from sparse observations is a challenging and important geospatial prediction problem. Given a set of locations where a species has been observed, the goal is to build a model to predict whether the species is present or absent at any location. This problem has a long history in ecology, but traditional methods struggle to take advantage of emerging large-scale crowdsourced datasets which can include tens of millions of observations of hundreds of thousands of species in addition to the availability of multi-modal data sources such as paired images and natural language descriptions. In this talk, I will present recent work from my group where we have developed deep learning-based solutions for estimating species’ ranges from sparse presence-only data. I will also discuss some of the open challenges that exist in this space.

Bio

Oisin Mac Aodha is a Reader in Machine Learning in the School of Informatics at the University of Edinburgh. He is also an ELLIS Scholar and former Turing Fellow. He obtained his PhD from University College London and was a postdoc at Caltech prior to his current role. His current research interests are in the areas of self-supervised learning, 3D vision, fine-grained learning, and human-in-the-loop learning. In addition, he works on questions related to AI for conservation and biodiversity monitoring.

• Speaker: Oisin Mac Aodha, University of Edinburgh
• Friday 11 April 2025, 13:00-14:00
• Venue: Main Seminar Room at the David Attenborough Building. Zoom link: https://cl-cam-ac-uk.zoom.us/j/4361570789?pwd=Nkl2T3ZLaTZwRm05bzRTOUUxY3Q4QT09&from=addon .
• Series: Energy and Environment Group, Department of CST; organiser: lyr24.

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Cambridge Immunology and Medicine Seminar - NO TALK

There will be no Cambridge Immunology and Medicine Seminar taking place on Thursday 17 April 2025.

• Speaker: Speaker to be confirmed
• Thursday 17 April 2025, 16:00-17:00
• Venue: Lecture Theatre, Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre, Cambridge Biomedical Campus.
• Series: Cambridge Immunology Network Seminar Series; organiser: Ruth Paton.

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Cambridge Immunology and Medicine Seminar - TBC

If you have a question about this talk, please contact Ruth Paton.

This Cambridge Immunology and Medicine Seminar will take place on Thursday 3 April 2025, starting at 4:00pm, in the Ground Floor Lecture Theatre, Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre (JCBC)

Speaker: TBC

Title: TBC

Host: TBC

Refreshments will be available following the seminar.

• Speaker: Speaker to be confirmed
• Thursday 03 April 2025, 16:00-17:00
• Venue: Lecture Theatre, Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre, Cambridge Biomedical Campus.
• Series: Cambridge Immunology Network Seminar Series; organiser: Ruth Paton.

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Prof. Jonathan Wilson Yewdell, Senior Investigator Cellular Biology and Viral Immunology Section, NIAID/DIR

This Cambridge Immunology and Medicine Seminar will take place on Thursday 29 May 2025, starting at 4:00pm, in the Ground Floor Lecture Theatre, Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre (JCBC)

Speaker: Prof. Jonathan W Yewdell, Senior Investigator Cellular Biology Cellular Biology and Viral Immunology Section, The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)

Title: TBC

Host: Prof. Louise Boyle, Department of Pathology, Cambridge

Refreshments will be available following the seminar.

• Speaker: Prof. Jonathan W Yewdell, Senior Investigator Cellular Biology Cellular Biology and Viral Immunology Section, The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID)
• Thursday 15 May 2025, 16:00-17:00
• Venue: Lecture Theatre, Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre, Cambridge Biomedical Campus.
• Series: Cambridge Immunology Network Seminar Series; organiser: Ruth Paton.

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Cambridge Immunology and Medicine Seminar - TBC

This Cambridge Immunology and Medicine Seminar will take place on Thursday 29 May 2025, starting at 4:00pm, in the Ground Floor Lecture Theatre, Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre (JCBC)

Speaker: TBC

Title: TBC

Host: TBC

Refreshments will be available following the seminar.

• Speaker: Speaker to be confirmed
• Thursday 29 May 2025, 16:00-17:00
• Venue: Lecture Theatre, Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre, Cambridge Biomedical Campus.
• Series: Cambridge Immunology Network Seminar Series; organiser: Ruth Paton.

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Inflammation in vaccines and infection: it’s (even) more complex than we think

This Cambridge Immunology and Medicine Seminar will take place on Thursday 24 April 2025, starting at 4:00pm, in the Ground Floor Lecture Theatre, Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre (JCBC)

Speaker: Prof John Tregoning, Professor of Vaccine Immunology at Imperial College London

Title: ‘Inflammation in vaccines and infection: it’s (even) more complex than we think’

Prof John Tregoning is currently Professor of Vaccine Immunology at Imperial College London, where he has studied the immune responses to vaccination and respiratory infection for more than 25 years. His group is currently focusing on the immune response to RNA vaccination. John has written more than 90 peer-reviewed scientific articles. He is also the author of two books Live Forever? A Curious Scientist’s Guide to Wellness, Disease and Ageing and Infectious: Pathogens and how we fight them.

Host: Ravindra Gupta, CITIID , Cambridge

Refreshments will be available following the seminar.

• Speaker: Prof John Tregoning, Professor of Vaccine Immunology at Imperial College London
• Thursday 24 April 2025, 16:00-17:00
• Venue: Lecture Theatre, Jeffrey Cheah Biomedical Centre, Cambridge Biomedical Campus.
• Series: Cambridge Immunology Network Seminar Series; organiser: Ruth Paton.

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