SCIENCE CHINA Materials•2026•DOI: 10.1007/s40843-026-4311-y
Chronic infections caused by biofilms of drug-resistant bacteria pose a significant challenge in clinical treatment. Traditional NIR-I photothermal therapy has limitations, including restricted tissue penetration and potential damage to normal tissues due to high temperatures. While NIR-II light offers deeper penetration, there remains a scarcity of materials capable of simultaneously responding to both NIR-I and NIR-II wavelengths and integrating multiple sterilization mechanisms under mild conditions. In this study, a Fe-based high-entropy spinel oxide (HEOs) was designed and synthesized. Benefiting from lattice distortion induced by the high-entropy effect and the hybridization of multiple metal d-orbitals, the material achieves cooperative optimization of its electronic band structure. Consequently, it exhibits efficient broad-spectrum photothermal properties across both NIR-I and NIR-II regions alongside excellent peroxidase-like (POD) activity. Under dual-wavelength laser irradiation, the material enables mild yet efficient photothermal conversion (<50 °C) while simultaneously catalyzing hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) to generate abundant hydroxyl radicals (·OH), thereby constructing a synergistic antibacterial system combining dual-window photothermal therapy and enzymatic catalysis. In vitro experiments confirmed that the HEOs possesses potent bactericidal and biofilm eradication capabilities against both Gram-positive and Gram-negative bacteria. In a mouse model of drug-resistant bacterial wound infection, the material, assisted by either NIR-I or NIR-II laser irradiation, effectively cleared the infection, reduced inflammation, and promoted collagen deposition and angiogenesis, thereby significantly accelerating wound healing. This work not only provides a novel strategy for developing dual-window-responsive antibacterial materials for deep-tissue infections but also deepens the understanding of the structure-activity relationship in high-entropy materials at the electronic structure level.
SCIENCE CHINA Materials•2026•DOI: 10.1007/s40843-026-4197-4
Deep-blue organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) remain the most challenging primary-color emitters due to stringent exciton energy requirements. We strategically designed two innovative deep-blue emitters, SCZ-4AnCN and STPA-4AnCN, via systematic functionalization of an anthracene core with arylamino-decorated spirofluorene donors and cyano-substituted phenyl acceptors. Comprehensive theoretical and experimental analyses demonstrate that these spirofluorene-anthracene hybrids adopt precisely engineered distorted configurations, effectively suppressing detrimental intermolecular π–π stacking in condensed phases. The sp3-hybridized bridgehead carbons in spirofluorene units play a pivotal role by simultaneously restricting π-conjugation extension and fine-tuning donor–acceptor interactions, thereby stabilizing the lowest excited singlet (S1) state with dominant local excitation (LE) character. This molecular engineering yields exceptional deep-blue emission with remarkable efficiency. Notably, the materials exhibit unique high-lying reverse intersystem crossing (hRISC) behavior, enabling efficient triplet harvesting. Optimized doped devices incorporating SCZ-4AnCN achieve outstanding performance, including a maximum external quantum efficiency (EQE_max) exceeding 10% and CIE coordinates (0.154, 0.052) approaching the BT.2020 blue standard. Nondoped devices maintain impressive performance with an EQE_max of 7.51% and superior operational stability, demonstrating less than 10% efficiency roll-off at 1000 cd m−2. This work validates anthracene-based molecular architectures for deep-blue electroluminescence and establishes a transformative design paradigm for next-generation OLED emitters.
SCIENCE CHINA Materials•2026•DOI: 10.1007/s40843-025-3642-4
High-density glass scintillators are promising alternatives to crystals for next-generation radiation detection due to their low cost, excellent physical and chemical stability, and processability. In this study, a series of Ce3+-activated gadolinium gallium borosilicate (GGBS x) glasses were synthesized via vacuum melt-quenching. With increasing Gd2O3 content, glass density increased from 5.86 to 6.05 g/cm3, and molar volume from 36.43 to 39.79 cm3/mol. Extended X-ray absorption fine structure (EXAFS) analysis revealed that in GGBS 1 glass, Ce3+ exclusively adopts a hexahedral [CeO6] configuration, while Gd3+ exhibits both hexahedral and octahedral coordination with a bond length of 2.35±0.1 Å and Debye-Waller factor σ2 of 0.0122±0.0015 Å2. As Gd2O3 content increased, shallow trap depth rose from 0.804 to 0.858 eV, while deep trap depth first increased from 0.948 to 1.434 eV then decreased to 1.010 eV. GGBS 1 glass exhibited high transmittance (~80%) in the visible range and a photoluminescence quantum yield of 78.4%. Under X-ray irradiation, its X-ray excited luminescence intensity reached 128.5% of that of Bi4Ge3O12 (BGO) crystal, with a spatial resolution of 29.1 lp/mm, approaching the highest reported for glass scintillators. Under γ-ray excitation, it achieved a light yield of 1058 photons/MeV and an energy resolution of 23.7% at 662 keV. These results indicate that GGBS 1 glass scintillator warrants further development for applications in X-ray imaging and γ-ray spectroscopy.