Molecular O Dimers and Lattice Instability in a Perovskite Electrocatalyst.

Structural degradation of oxide electrodes during the electrocatalytic oxygen evolution reaction (OER) is a major challenge in water electrolysis. Although the OER is known to induce changes in the surface layer, little is known about its effect on the bulk of the electrocatalyst and its overall phase stability. Here, we show that under OER conditions, a highly active SrCoO electrocatalyst develops bulk lattice instability, which results in the formation of molecular O dimers inside the bulk and nanoscale amorphization induced via chemo-mechanical coupling.

Tuning MXene Properties through Cu Intercalation: Coupled Guest/Host Redox and Pseudocapacitance.

MXenes are 2D transition metal carbides, nitrides, and/or carbonitrides that can be intercalated with cations through chemical or electrochemical pathways. While the insertion of alkali and alkaline earth cations into TiCT MXenes is well studied, understanding of the intercalation of redox-active transition metal ions into MXenes and its impact on their electronic and electrochemical properties is lacking. In this work, we investigate the intercalation of Cu ions into TiCT MXene and its effect on its electronic and electrochemical properties.

Tailoring of magnetism & electron transport of manganate thin films by controlling the Mn-O-Mn bond angles via strain engineering.

Strain engineering beyond substrate limitation of colossal magnetoresistant thin (LaPr)CaMnO (LPCMO) films on LaAlO-buffered SrTiO (LAO/STO) substrates has been demonstrated using metalorganic aerosol deposition technique. By growing partially relaxed 7-27 nm thick heteroepitaxial LAO buffer layers on STO a perfect lattice matching to the LPCMO has been achieved. As a result, strain-free heteroepitaxial 10-20 nm thick LPCMO/LAO/STO films with bulk-like ferromagnetic metallic ground state were obtained.

Ultrafast Laser-Induced Dynamics of Non-Equilibrium Electron Spill-Out in Nanoplasmonic Bilayers.

Contemporary quantum plasmonics capture subtle corrections to the properties of plasmonic nano-objects in equilibrium. Here, we demonstrate non-equilibrium spill-out redistribution of the electronic density at the ultrafast time scale. As revealed by time-resolved 2D spectroscopy of nanoplasmonic Fe/Au bilayers, an injection of the laser-excited non-thermal electrons induces transient electron spill-out thus changing the plasma frequency.

Magnetism and Thermal Transport of Exchange-Spring-Coupled LaSrMnO/LaMnCoO Superlattices with Perpendicular Magnetic Anisotropy.

Superlattices (SLs) comprising layers of a soft ferromagnetic metal LaSrMnO (LSMO) with in-plane (IP) magnetic easy axis and a hard ferromagnetic insulator LaMnCoO (LMCO, out-of-plane anisotropy) were grown on SrTiO (100)(STO) substrates by a metalorganic aerosol deposition technique. Exchange spring magnetic (ESM) behavior between LSMO and LMCO, manifested by a spin reorientation transition of the LSMO layers towards perpendicular magnetic anisotropy below = 260 K, was observed. Further, 3ω measurements of the [(LMCO)/(LSMO)]/STO(100) superlattices revealed extremely low values of the cross-plane thermal conductivity (300 K) = 0.