A joint research team led by Dr. Young-Jun Jang and Dr. Jongkuk Kim of the Extreme Materials Research Institute, in collaboration with Dr. Sungmo Moon’s team from the Energy and Environment Materials Research Division at the Korea Institute of Materials Science (KIMS) has successfully developed Korea’s first high corrosion- and wear-resistant carbon coating technology to mitigate the severe corrosion and wear issues associated with ammonia fuel. This technology is expected to serve as a key enabling platform for accelerating the commercialization of eco-friendly ammonia-powered ships.

Wood, once regarded primarily as a structural material, possesses rich physicochemical complexity that has long been underexplored. In the context of industrialization and carbon imbalance, it is now emerging as a renewable and multifunctional platform for green nanotechnologies. Recent advances in wood nanotechnology have enabled the transformation of natural wood into programmable substrates with tailored nanoarchitectures, establishing it as a representative class of bio-based nanomaterials. This review systematically categorizes wood-specific nanoengineering strategies—including thermal carbonization, laser-induced graphenization, targeted delignification, nanomaterial integration, and mechanical processing—highlighting their mechanisms and impacts on wood’s multiscale structural and functional properties. Importantly, these functionalization strategies can be flexibly combined in a modular, “Lego-like” manner, enabling wood to be reconfigured and optimized for diverse application scenarios. We summarize recent progress in applying functionalized wood to sustainable technologies such as energy storage (e.g., metal-ion batteries, Zn–air systems, supercapacitors), water treatment (e.g., adsorption, photothermal filtration, catalytic degradation), and energy conversion (e.g., solar evaporation, ionic thermoelectrics, hydrovoltaics, and triboelectric nanogenerators). These studies reveal how nanoengineered wood structures can enable efficient charge transport, selective adsorption, and enhanced light-to-heat conversion. Finally, the review discusses current challenges—such as scalable fabrication, material integration, and long-term environmental stability—and outlines future directions for the development of wood-based platforms in next-generation green energy and environmental systems.

This  editorial continues our highlights of the highest independently confirmed yearly efficiencies of mainstream solar cell technologies including silicon, perovskite and organic, and analyzes the progress of each cell technology. The year 2025 was unusual for the photovoltaic (PV) industry, characterized by low costs and fierce competition, redefining competition toward extreme efficiency optimization. All single-junction silicon, perovskite, and organic solar cells, as well as tandem solar cells in various combinations, achieved new world-record power conversion efficiencies in 2025.

Direct air capture (DAC) is an emerging technology aimed at mitigating global warming. However, conventional DAC technologies and the subsequent utilization processes are complex and energy-intensive. An integrated system of direct air capture and utilization (IDACU) via in-situ catalytic conversion to fuels and chemicals is a promising approach, although it remains in the early stages of development. This review examines the current technical routes of IDACU, including solid-based dual-functional materials (DFMs) through thermo-catalysis, IDACU using liquid sorbents with thermo-catalysis, and non-thermal conversion methods. It covers the basic principles, reaction conditions, main products, material types, and the existing problems and challenges associated with these technical routes. Additionally, it discusses the recent advancements in solid-based DFMs for IDACU, with particular attention to the differences in material characteristics between carbon capture from flue gases (ICCU) and DAC. While IDACU technology holds significant promise, it still faces numerous challenges, especially in the design of advanced materials.

Duan and co-workers developed a phosphorus-carbon-bridged cyclization strategy for MR-TADF emitters, addressing the challenge of balancing narrowband emission and efficient RISC. It rigidifies skeletons to suppress high-frequency vibrations and leverages P/S heavy-atom effects to enhance spin-orbital coupling. Two blue emitters, BCzBN-PO (467 nm, 19 nm FWHM) and BCzBN-PS (474 nm, 18 nm FWHM), were synthesized. BCzBN-PS achieved a k_RISC of 8.5×10⁵ s⁻¹ (8-fold higher than BCzBN-PO). Non-sensitized OLEDs showed FWHM < 30 nm and EQE > 20%, while TADF-sensitized devices exhibited higher EQE (43.0% vs. 41.2%) and lower roll-off (25.9% vs. 30.1% at 1000 cd m⁻²) for BCzBN-PS. This work establishes a paradigm balancing color purity and exciton utilization, advancing narrowband electroluminescence.