CMP Journal 2025-01-16

Statistics

Nature: 2

Nature Nanotechnology: 2

Physical Review Letters: 7

Physical Review X: 1

Nature

A generative model for inorganic materials design

Original Paper | Computer science | 2025-01-15 19:00 EST

Claudio Zeni, Robert Pinsler, Daniel Zügner, Andrew Fowler, Matthew Horton, Xiang Fu, Zilong Wang, Aliaksandra Shysheya, Jonathan Crabbé, Shoko Ueda, Roberto Sordillo, Lixin Sun, Jake Smith, Bichlien Nguyen, Hannes Schulz, Sarah Lewis, Chin-Wei Huang, Ziheng Lu, Yichi Zhou, Han Yang, Hongxia Hao, Jielan Li, Chunlei Yang, Wenjie Li, Ryota Tomioka, Tian Xie

The design of functional materials with desired properties is essential in driving technological advances in areas like energy storage, catalysis, and carbon capture^1-3. Generative models provide a new paradigm for materials design by directly generating novel materials given desired property constraints, but current methods have low success rate in proposing stable crystals or can only satisfy a limited set of property constraints ^4-11. Here, we present MatterGen, a model that generates stable, diverse inorganic materials across the periodic table and can further be fine-tuned to steer the generation towards a broad range of property constraints. Compared to prior generative models ^4,12, structures produced by MatterGen are more than twice as likely to be novel and stable, and more than 10 times closer to the local energy minimum. After fine-tuning, MatterGen successfully generates stable, novel materials with desired chemistry, symmetry, as well as mechanical, electronic and magnetic properties. As a proof of concept, we synthesize one of the generated structures and measure its property value to be within 20 % of our target. We believe that the quality of generated materials and the breadth of MatterGen's capabilities represent a major advancement towards creating a foundational generative model for materials design.

Nature (2025)

Computer science, Theory and computation

Brain-wide neuronal circuit connectome of human glioblastoma

Original Paper | Cancer in the nervous system | 2025-01-15 19:00 EST

Yusha Sun, Xin Wang, Daniel Y. Zhang, Zhijian Zhang, Janardhan P. Bhattarai, Yingqi Wang, Kristen H. Park, Weifan Dong, Yun-Fen Hung, Qian Yang, Feng Zhang, Keerthi Rajamani, Shang Mu, Benjamin C. Kennedy, Yan Hong, Jamie Galanaugh, Abhijeet Sambangi, Sang Hoon Kim, Garrett Wheeler, Tiago Gonçalves, Qing Wang, Daniel Geschwind, Riki Kawaguchi, Angela N. Viaene, Ingo Helbig, Sudha K. Kessler, Ahmet Hoke, Huadong Wang, Fuqiang Xu, Zev A. Binder, H. Isaac Chen, Emily Ling-Lin Pai, Sara Stone, MacLean P. Nasrallah, Kimberly M. Christian, Marc Fuccillo, Nicolas Toni, Zhuhao Wu, Hwai-Jong Cheng, Donald M. O'Rourke, Minghong Ma, Guo-li Ming, Hongjun Song

Glioblastoma (GBM) infiltrates the brain and can be synaptically innervated by neurons, which drives tumor progression^1,2. Synaptic inputs onto GBM cells identified so far are largely short-range and glutamatergic^3,4. The extent of GBM integration into the brain-wide neuronal circuitry remains unclear. Here we applied rabies virus- and herpes simplex virus-mediated trans-monosynaptic tracing^5,6 to systematically investigate circuit integration of human GBM organoids transplanted into adult mice. We found that GBM cells from multiple patients rapidly integrate into diverse local and long-range neural circuits across the brain. Beyond glutamatergic inputs, we identified various neuromodulatory inputs, including synapses between basal forebrain cholinergic neurons and GBM cells. Acute acetylcholine stimulation induces long-lasting elevation of calcium oscillations and transcriptional reprogramming of GBM cells into a more motile state via the metabotropic CHRM3 receptor. CHRM3 activation promotes GBM cell motility, whereas its downregulation suppresses GBM cell motility and prolongs mouse survival. Together, these results reveal the striking capacity for human GBM cells to rapidly and robustly integrate into anatomically diverse neuronal networks of different neurotransmitter systems. Our findings further support a model wherein rapid connectivity and transient activation of upstream neurons may lead to a long-lasting increase in tumor fitness.

Nature (2025)

Cancer in the nervous system, CNS cancer

Nature Nanotechnology

Dipolar wavevector interference induces a polar skyrmion lattice in strained BiFeO3 films

Original Paper | Ferroelectrics and multiferroics | 2025-01-15 19:00 EST

W. R. Geng, Y. L. Zhu, M. X. Zhu, Y. L. Tang, H. J. Zhao, C. H. Lei, Y. J. Wang, J. H. Wang, R. J. Jiang, S. Z. Liu, X. Y. San, Y. P. Feng, M. J. Zou, X. L. Ma

Skyrmions can form regular arrangements, so-called skyrmion crystals (SkXs). A mode with multiple wavevectors q then describes the arrangement. While magnetic SkXs, which can emerge in the presence of Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction, are well established, polar skyrmion lattices are still elusive. Here we report the observation of polar SkXs with a well-defined double-q state in ultrathin BiFeO₃ films on LaAlO₃. The compressive strain induced by the LaAlO₃ substrate yields a dipolar topological texture with a periodic arrangement of skyrmions. The square-like superstructure with a lattice constant of 2.68 nm features a periodic modulation of polarization fields and topological charge density. The film furthermore exhibits an enhanced electromechanical response with an increased converse piezoelectric coefficient (d₃₃) compared with SkX-free films. Transmission electron microscopy experiments in combination with phase-field simulations indicate that the dipole skyrmion texture results from the interference of two orthogonal single-q dipole patterns. We anticipate that the interference of multiple wavevectors may lead to a diversity of topological crystals with a variety of symmetries and lattice constants.

Nat. Nanotechnol. (2025)

Ferroelectrics and multiferroics, Surfaces, interfaces and thin films

Chemistry, manufacturing and controls strategies for using novel excipients in lipid nanoparticles

Review Paper | Analytical chemistry | 2025-01-15 19:00 EST

Matthew O'Brien Laramy, David A. Foley, Roger H. Pak, Jacob A. Lewis, Eric McKinney, Patricia M. Egan, Ravikiran Yerabolu, Eric Dane, Olivier Dirat, Lindsey Saunders Gorka, Joseph R. Martinelli, Ehab M. Moussa, Julie Barthuet

Lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) for nucleic acid delivery often use novel lipids as functional excipients to modulate the biodistribution, pharmacokinetics, pharmacodynamics and efficacy of the nucleic acid. Novel excipients used in pharmaceutical products are subject to heightened regulatory scrutiny and often require data packages comparable to an active pharmaceutical ingredient. Although these regulatory requirements may help to ensure patient safety they also create economic and procedural barriers that can disincentivize innovation and delay clinical investigation. Despite the unique structural and functional role of lipid excipients in LNPs, there is limited specific global regulatory guidance, which adds uncertainty and risk to the development of LNPs. In this Perspective we provide an industry view on the chemistry, manufacturing and controls challenges that pharmaceutical companies face in the use of novel lipid excipients at each stage of development, and propose consensus recommendations on how to streamline and clarify development and regulatory expectations.

Nat. Nanotechnol. (2025)

Analytical chemistry, Drug delivery, Molecular self-assembly, Nanoparticles

Physical Review Letters

Protect Measurement-Induced Phase Transition from Noise

Research article | Dynamical phase transitions | 2025-01-16 05:00 EST

Dongheng Qian and Jing Wang

Scrambling dynamics induced by random unitary gates can protect information from low-rate measurements, which underpins the phenomenon known as the measurement-induced phase transition (MIPT). However, typical decoherence noise disrupts the volume-law phase, complicating the observation of the MIPT on noisy intermediate-scale quantum devices. Here, we demonstrate that incorporating quantum-enhanced operations can effectively protect the MIPT from environmental noise, thereby enabling its detection in experiment. The transition is characterized by conditional entanglement entropy, which is associated with a statistical mechanics model wherein noise and quantum-enhanced operations act as competing external random fields. When the net external field is zero, a ferromagnetic-paramagnetic phase transition is expected, resulting in the MIPT. This zero-field condition also ensures an average apparatus-environment symmetry, making conditional entanglement entropy a valid probe of entanglement and establishing the transition as a genuine entanglement phase transition. Additionally, we provide numerical results that demonstrate the MIPT in a (\(2+1\))-dimensional quantum circuit under dephasing noise. We also propose a method to estimate the noise rate, enabling the zero-field condition to be achieved experimentally and ensuring the feasibility of our protocol. Our result serves as a concrete example of the power of quantum enhancement in combating noise.

Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 020403 (2025)

Dynamical phase transitions, Open quantum systems, Quantum channels, Quantum circuits, Quantum entanglement, Quantum error correction, Quantum measurements, Quantum phase transitions, Finite-size scaling

\(^{115}{\mathrm{In}}^{+}\text{- }^{172}{\mathrm{Yb}}^{+}\) Coulomb Crystal Clock with \(2.5\times{}{10}^{- 18}\) Systematic Uncertainty

Research article | Atomic, optical & lattice clocks | 2025-01-16 05:00 EST

H. N. Hausser, J. Keller, T. Nordmann, N. M. Bhatt, J. Kiethe, H. Liu, I. M. Richter, M. von Boehn, J. Rahm, S. Weyers, E. Benkler, B. Lipphardt, S. Dörscher, K. Stahl, J. Klose, C. Lisdat, M. Filzinger, N. Huntemann, E. Peik, and T. E. Mehlstäubler

Researchers have built an optical clock using an array of trapped ions--an architecture that can be scaled up to boost the clock's precision.

Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 023201 (2025)

Atomic, optical & lattice clocks, Laser spectroscopy, Time & frequency standards, Ions, Atom & ion cooling, Optical spectroscopy

Enabling All-to-Circular Polarization Up-conversion by Nonlinear Chiral Metasurfaces with Rotational Symmetry

Research article | Metasurfaces | 2025-01-16 05:00 EST

Dmitrii Gromyko, Jun Siang Loh, Jiangang Feng, Cheng-Wei Qiu, and Lin Wu

We introduce a stacking strategy to design nonlinear chiral metasurfaces with high rotational symmetry, enabling degenerate quasi-bound-in-the-continuum resonances of absolute chirality. This symmetry allows for converting a circularly polarized pump into a circularly polarized nonlinear signal. Consequently, our rotation-symmetric bilayered metasurface design, tailored to respond solely to one specific circular polarization, can up-convert a linear or arbitrary polarized pump into circularly polarized nonlinear signals. The intensity ratios of these signals scale as the fourth (second) power of the chiral resonance amplitude for the second (third) harmonic.

Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 023804 (2025)

Metasurfaces, Nonlinear optics, Coupled mode theory

Superconducting Meron Phase in Locally Noncentrosymmetric Superconductors

Research article | Pair density wave | 2025-01-16 05:00 EST

Akihiro Minamide and Youichi Yanase

The theory of superconducting parity transition is extended by incorporating the vortex degree of freedom. We employ the bilayer Rashba model representing locally noncentrosymmetric layered superconductors and derive the Ginzburg-Landau free energy functional. This formulation reveals parity transition, where the even-parity superconducting state changes to the odd-parity one upon increasing the magnetic field under the vortex states. The \(H\text{- }T\) phase diagram of \({\mathrm{CeRh}}_{2}{\mathrm{As}}_{2}\) is quantitatively reproduced and a novel superconducting state with a meron (half-skyrmion) lattice pseudospin texture is predicted.

Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 026002 (2025)

Pair density wave, Phase diagrams, Spin-orbit coupling, Superconducting phase transition, Superconductivity, Vortices in superconductors, Layered crystals, Unconventional superconductors, BCS theory, Landau-Ginzburg theory

Orbital Diffusion, Polarization, and Swapping in Centrosymmetric Metals

Research article | Orbital order | 2025-01-16 05:00 EST

Xiaobai Ning, A. Pezo, Kyoung-Whan Kim, Weisheng Zhao, Kyung-Jin Lee, and Aurélien Manchon

A theory of charge, spin, and orbital diffusion applied to multiband materials and heterostructures suggests that the diffusivity of orbital angular momentum in metals is typically much lower than that of spin or charge.

Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 026303 (2025)

Orbital order, Spin torque, Spin-orbit coupling, Spintronics, Transport phenomena

Quantum Nonlinear Acoustic Hall Effect and Inverse Acoustic Faraday Effect in Dirac Insulators

Research article | Dirac fermions | 2025-01-16 05:00 EST

Ying Su, Alexander V. Balatsky, and Shi-Zeng Lin

We propose to realize the quantum nonlinear Hall effect and the inverse Faraday effect through the acoustic wave in a time-reversal invariant but inversion broken Dirac insulator. We focus on the acoustic frequency much lower than the Dirac gap such that the interband transition is suppressed and these effects arise solely from the intrinsic valley-contrasting band topology. The corresponding acoustoelectric conductivity and magnetoacoustic susceptibility are both proportional to the quantized valley Chern number and independent of the quasiparticle lifetime. The linear and nonlinear components of the longitudinal and transverse topological currents can be tuned by adjusting the polarization and propagation directions of the surface acoustic wave. The static magnetization generated by a circularly polarized acoustic wave scales linearly with the acoustic frequency as well as the strain-induced charge density. Our results unveil a quantized nonlinear topological acoustoelectric response of gapped Dirac materials, like hexagonal boron nitride and transition-metal dichalcogenide, paving the way toward room-temperature acoustoelectric devices due to their large band gaps.

Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 026304 (2025)

Dirac fermions, Magnetoacoustic effect, Quantum Hall effect, Surface acoustic wave

Giant Third-Order Nonlinearity Induced by the Quantum Metric Quadrupole in Few-Layer \({\mathrm{WTe}}_{2}\)

Research article | Electrical conductivity | 2025-01-16 05:00 EST

Xing-Yu Liu, An-Qi Wang, Dong Li, Tong-Yang Zhao, Xin Liao, and Zhi-Min Liao

The quantum geometric properties of topological materials underpin many exotic physical phenomena and applications. Quantum nonlinearity has emerged as a powerful probe for revealing these properties. The Berry curvature dipole in nonmagnetic materials and the quantum metric dipole in antiferromagnets have been explored by studying the second-order nonlinear Hall effect. Although the quadrupole moment of the quantum geometric tensor is theoretically predicted to induce higher-order quantum nonlinearity, the quantum metric quadrupole remains experimentally unexplored. Here, we report the quantum metric quadrupole induced third-order nonlinear longitudinal electrical response in few-layer \({\mathrm{WTe}}_{2}\), persisting up to room temperature. Angle-resolved third-harmonic current-voltage characteristics are found consistent with the intrinsic crystal symmetry of \({\mathrm{WTe}}_{2}\). Through temperature variation and scaling analysis, we identify the quantum metric quadrupole as the physical origin of the observed third-order longitudinal nonlinearity. Additionally, we determine the angle dependence of the quantum metric quadrupole, establishing third-order nonlinearity as an efficient method for revealing the quantum metric structure.

Phys. Rev. Lett. 134, 026305 (2025)

Electrical conductivity, Transition metal dichalcogenides, Resistivity measurements

Physical Review X

Probing Electronic Coherence between Core-Level Vacancies at Different Atomic Sites

Research article | Atomic & molecular processes in external fields | 2025-01-16 05:00 EST

Jun Wang et al.

et al.An attosecond x-ray method reveals a type of electronic evolution in molecules driven by quantum coherence, paving the way to new insights into collective electron motion during the first moments of light-matter interaction.

Phys. Rev. X 15, 011008 (2025)

Atomic & molecular processes in external fields, Autoionization & Auger processes, Inner-shell processes, Photoemission, Ultrafast phenomena