SCIENCE CHINA Materials•2026•DOI: 10.1007/s40843-026-4391-5
Self-assembled monolayers (SAMs) enable precise tuning of the ITO/active layer interfacial dipole, yet their impact on the crystallization kinetics of the overlying active layer remains poorly understood, limiting their potential in high-efficiency organic solar cells. This study introduces THPC, a self-assembling material with an extended carbazole core and heteroatom substitution, as a hole transport layer (HTL). Unlike the hydrophilic PEDOT:PSS, THPC exhibits low surface energy, providing a favorable template that extends the film formation kinetics of the PM6:L8-BO-X blend by nearly 1.4 times, mitigating the explosive nucleation prevalent in PM6-based active layers. This promotes a highly ordered fibrous morphology and enhances vertical phase separation. The deep work function of THPC (5.32 eV) increases the built-in potential, reduces interfacial trap density, and facilitates charge extraction. Consequently, non-radiative recombination loss decreases from 0.243 eV to 0.227 eV, and the open-circuit voltage rises from 0.866 V to 0.883 V, yielding a power conversion efficiency (PCE) of 20.19%, outperforming the PEDOT:PSS control (18.67%). This finding is confirmed across multiple Y-series acceptors, all approaching 20% PCE. Notably, the D18:L8-BO system achieves a PCE of 20.55%, demonstrating broad applicability.
SCIENCE CHINA Materials•2026•DOI: 10.1007/s40843-026-4494-9
Superionic conductors exhibit high cation mobility arising from weak binding and continuous transport pathways, atomistically characterized by extensive structural disorder and partial occupancy akin to amorphization. This disorder, whether confined to a cation sublattice or extended to full amorphization, strongly impedes lattice thermal transport, rendering these materials intrinsically ideal thermal insulators. This work investigates Ag26I18W4O16, a superionic conductor tunable from fully amorphous to single-crystalline states, as a model system to probe the impact of disorder and amorphization on thermal transport. Extensive Ag+ disorder, in both crystalline and amorphous phases, reduces thermal conductivity to approximately the theoretical lower bound of 0.16 W/m-K with virtually no temperature dependence, while concurrently achieving the lowest mean sound velocity ever recorded for a dense solid. Pair distribution function (PDF) analysis of synchrotron X-ray total scattering data indicates that short-range disorder (< 5 Å), rather than long-range periodicity, governs thermal insulation performance in both phases. These findings suggest a design strategy reconciling structural stability with glass-like thermal insulation.
Journal of Fuel Chemistry and Technology•2026•DOI: 10.3724/2097-213X.2025.JFCT.0029
Pingshuo coal ash, characterized by high silicon-aluminum content (Si+Al >85%) and low Si/Al ratio (<1.5), exhibits ash fusion temperatures (AFTs) exceeding 1550 °C, rendering it unsuitable for entrained-flow gasifiers. This study investigates the effect of calcium-sodium composite flux on ash fusibility and mineral transformation. X-ray diffraction (XRD) and FactSage thermodynamic simulations were employed to analyze mineral evolution, while molecular dynamics (MD) simulations revealed the underlying melting mechanism. Results show that adding 20% composite flux (CaO/Na2O) lowers AFTs more effectively than equivalent additions of CaO or Na2O alone, indicating a synergistic effect. At a CaO/Na2O ratio of 3:7, the flow temperatures (FT) of two Pingshuo coal ashes decreased to 1377 °C and 1279 °C, respectively. The composite flux promotes reactions between quartz and Na2O/CaO, forming low-melting-point minerals such as nepheline, albite, and gehlenite, while inhibiting mullite formation. Additionally, Na+ disrupts the silicate network, inducing Ca2+ to preferentially coordinate with [AlO4]5- tetrahedra, further breaking Si-O-Si bonds. MD simulations show that atomic diffusion, quantified by mean square displacement (MSD), is significantly enhanced below 1600 K with composite flux addition compared to single fluxes. These findings provide a mechanistic basis for optimizing flux formulations to enable efficient gasification of high-AFT coals.