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Bioinspired nanoporous membranes show great potential in ionic separation and water filtration by offering high selectivity with less permeation resistance. However, complex processes always limit their applications. Here, we report a convenient approach to introduce ionic selective channels in a micron-thick polycarbonate membrane through swift heavy ion irradiation accompanied by UV sensitization and pulsed-electrical etching. The characteristic dimension of channels was tuned through regulating energy loss of the incident ion and UV sensitization time of the membrane, resulting in the sub-nanoporous membranes with mean channel diameter ranging from2.4 to 9.7 Å. These membranes showed the voltage-activated ionic transport properties associated with the dehydration effect, and the corresponding

Magnetic nanostructures with conical shape are highly desired for pursuing extraordinary magnetic properties and microwave absorption. However, the fabrication of such nanostructures with controlled shape and size uniformities and alignment is not yet realized. Accordingly, the magnetic properties and their application as microwave absorber are not well understood. Here, we report on the first demonstration of controlled fabrication of soft magnetic nickel nanocone arrays with sharp geometry, large aspect ratio, uniform size, and parallel alignment. The imaginary part of the relative complex permeability shows multiband absorption in the 2-17 GHz range. Such an exceptional microwave absorption results from the uniform conical shape and size and the parallel alignment. The absorption mechanisms are discussed under the framework of natural resonance and exchange resonance. The natural resonance is dependent on the shape anisotropy and facilitated by the conical geometry. The exchange resonance is well explained by the observation of the bulk spin waves with exchange coupling at the tip of nanocones using the inelastic light scattering and is consistent with exchange theory predictions for the quantization of bulk spin waves. We expect that our work will shed light on the physical insights into the magnetic properties of nanocones and find great potential in applications of microwave absorption.

Graphene oxide (GO) has become a promising 2D material in many areas, such as gas separation, seawater desalination, antibacterial materials, and so on because of its abundant oxygen-containing functional groups and excellent dispersibility in various solvents. The graphene oxide membrane (GOM), a laminar and channel-rich structure assembled by stacked GO nanosheets, served as a kind of precise and ultrafast separation material has attracted widespread attention in membrane separation field. To break the trade-off between ion permeability and ion selectivity of separation membrane based on GOM, GOM/conical nanopore system is obtained by spin-coating ultrathin GOM on PET conical nanopore, which possesses ion rectification property. Comparing to pure PET conical nanopore, the existence of GOM not only enhances the cation conductance but also makes the ion rectification ratio increase from 4.6 to 238.0 in KCl solution. Assisted by COMSOL simulation, it is proved that the GOM can absorb large amount of cations and act as cation source to improve the ion selectivity and rectification effect of GOM/conical nanopore system. Finally, the chemical stability of GOM/conical nanopore is also investigated and the corresponding results reveal that the GOM/conical nanopore system can perform the ion rectification behavior in a wider pH range than pure PET conical nanopore. The presented findings demonstrate the great potential applications of GOM/conical nanopore system in ionic logic circuits and sensor systems.

Metal nanostructures with conical shape, vertical alignment, large ratio of cone height and curvature radius at the apex, controlled cone angle, and single-crystal structure are ideal candidates for enhancing field electron-emission efficiency with additional merits, such as good mechanical and thermal stability. However, fabrication of such nanostructures possessing all these features is challenging. Here, we report on the controlled fabrication of large scale, vertically aligned, and mechanically self-supported single-crystal Cu nanocones with controlled cone angle and enhanced field emission. The Cu nanocones were fabricated by ion-track templates in combination with electrochemical deposition. Their cone angle is controlled in the range from 0.3° to 6.2° by asymmetrically selective etching of the ion tracks and the minimum tip curvature diameter reaches down to 6 nm. The field emission measurements show that the turn-on electric field of the Cu nanocone field emitters can be as low as 1.9 V/μm at current density of 10 μA/cm(2) (a record low value for Cu nanostructures, to the best of our knowledge). The maximum field enhancement factor we measured was as large as 6068, indicating that the Cu nanocones are promising candidates for field emission applications.