Organic single-crystalline p-n junctions are grown from mixed solutions. First, C60 crystals (n-type) form and, subsequently, C8-BTBT crystals (p-type) nucleate heterogeneously on the C60 crystals. Both crystals continue to grow simultaneously into single-crystalline p-n junctions that exhibit ambipolar charge transport characteristics. This work provides a platform to study organic single-crystalline p-n junctions.

Synthetic single crystals are usually homogeneous solids. Biogenic single crystals, however, can incorporate biomacromolecules and become inhomogeneous solids so that their properties are also extrinsically regulated by the incorporated materials. The discrepancy between the properties of synthetic and biogenic single crystals leads to the idea to modify the internal structure of synthetic crystals to achieve nonintrinsic properties by incorporation of foreign material. Intrinsically colorless and diamagnetic calcite single crystals are turned into colored and paramagnetic solids, through incorporation of Au and Fe3O4 nanoparticles without significantly disrupting the crystalline lattice of calcite. The crystals incorporate the nanoparticles and gel fibers when grown in agarose gel media containing the nanoparticles, whereas the solution-grown crystals do not. As such, our work extends the long-history gel method for crystallization into a platform to functionalize single-crystalline materials.

Single crystals are usually faceted solids with homogeneous chemical compositions. Biogenic and synthetic calcite single crystals, however, have been found to incorporate macromolecules, spurring investigations of how large molecules are distributed within the crystals without substantially disrupting the crystalline lattice. Here, electron tomography reveals how random, three-dimensional networks of agarose nanofibers are incorporated into single crystals of synthetic calcite by allowing both high- and low-energy fiber/crystal interface facets to satisfy network curvatures. These results suggest that physical entrapment of polymer aggregates is a viable mechanism by which macromolecules can become incorporated inside inorganic single crystals. As such, this work has implications for understanding the structure and formation of biominerals as well as toward the development of new high–surface area, single-crystal composite materials.

Carbon black (CB) nanoparticles were encapsulated by poly(vinyl alcohol) (PVA) by a simple method of coacervation. Transmission electron microscopy (TEM) images clearly demonstrated that the successful encapsulation of PVA happened at the surfaces of CB nanoparticles. The particle-size distribution measurements indicated that the diameters of the obtained PVA-encapsulated CB (CB@PVA) nanoparticles were distributed within the nanoscale dimension. This strategy avoids the complicated polymerization process involved in the counterpart of polymer-coating approaches.

This paper describes the internal structure of calcite (CaCO3) crystals grown in an agarose hydrogel and demonstrates that the gel-grown calcite crystals, like biogenic calcite crystals, incorporate the organic matrix, resulting in internal structures with pores on the order of 100's of nanometers.