In the quest for sustainable and efficient methods to detect heavy metals in the environment, a new study titled "Microwave-Assisted Synthesis of Biomass-Derived N-Doped Carbon Dots for Metal Ion Sensing" offers a promising solution. This research explores the innovative use of microwave-assisted synthesis to create nitrogen-doped carbon dots from biomass, providing a green and effective approach to metal ion sensing.

Recently, the team of Academician Xiaojun Peng from Dalian University of Technology, Associate Professor Haidong Li, and the team of Professor Juyoung Yoon from Ewha Womans University, South Korea cooperated to develop a series of near-infrared (NIR) dyes with aggregation-induced emission (AIE) characteristics, based on an electron-acceptor engineering strategy to regulate the excited-state dynamic processes of dyes. By introducing diphenylamine into the xanthene structural unit, due to the increase in freely rotatable single bonds and asymmetric structures, the dyes exhibited enhanced AIE characteristics as well as potential for photodynamic therapy (PDT), photothermal therapy (PTT), and photoacoustic imaging (PAI). Variation in the number of cyano groups within the dyes could regulate their excitation wavelength, PDT efficacy, and PTT capability. Experimental results showed that Hcy-ON displayed high ROS production and heat-generating capacity under 760 nm laser irradiation. Molecular theoretical calculations indicated that Hcy-ON exhibited a significant spin–orbit coupling matrix element (SOCME) value <S₁|SOC|T₃>, with the minimum energy gap between S₁ and T₁ energy levels being 0.678 eV, which is related to its strongest ROS generation capability. In addition, analyses of the singlet–triplet (S–T) energy gap, electron transition mechanism, root-mean-square displacement (RMSD) value, and Huang–Rhys factor confirmed the excellent photothermal performance of Hcy-ON. This strategy provides a new paradigm for constructing multimodal light-driven tumor therapies. This research work was published in CCS Chemistry.

Improving living conditions for Parkinson's patients, and diagnoses for patients suffering from inflammatory processes. The medical field is the common factor in these Politecnico di Milano research projects, which have been awarded two ERC (European Research Council) Starting Grants with a funding of 1.5 million each, for a duration of five years. The prestigious awards were won by researchers Emanuele Riva from the Department of Mechanical Engineering with the LUMEN project and Claudio Conci from the Department of Chemistry, Materials, and Chemical Engineering “Giulio Natta” with the ALFRED project. A total of 55 Italian researchers are among the 478 selected by the European Research Council for 2025, with a total of 761 million EUR going to support the proposed ideas.

A new class of 2D materials known as MXenes holds the key to next-generation applications, such as consumer electronics and medical devices. Now, collaborative research led by Zahra Fakhraai and Aleksandra Vojvodic of the University of Pennsylvania offers fundamental insights into the chemical and geometric mechanisms underlying the synthesis of these materials, a finding that could lead to cleaner, quicker energy conversion and storage for these devices.

Researchers at Caltech and Gran Sasso Science Institute in Italy teamed up with Google DeepMind to develop a new AI method–called Deep Loop Shaping–that can better hush unwanted noise in LIGO's detectors.

Researchers have developed novel chiral magnetic nanohelices that can control electron spin at room temperature by utilizing their inherent rotation, eliminating the need for external magnetic fields or cryogenic cooling. This breakthrough demonstrates spin-selective transport capabilities through geometrically designed magnetic nanostructures.

A research team led by Prof. WANG Feng from the Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics (DICP) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, along with Prof. Paolo Fornasiero from the University of Trieste in Italy, has developed a photochemical strategy for heterolytic hydrogen (H₂) dissociation at ambient temperature, a long-standing challenge in H₂ activation chemistry.