2023​

• Nov 26 2023   Dr. Li is invited to serve as a session co-chair in Symposium SF02: Crystallization and Assembly at Interfaces—Fundamental Breakthroughs Enabled by Data-Centric Analysis and In Situ/Operando Techniques. Looking forward to exciting research from our materials research society.

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• Oct 14 2023   Dr. Li was recently appointed to join the Nanoscale Horizons Community board. I am ready to engage with other scientists and to contribute to the scientific publications for our research community!

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• Sep 19 2023   Dr. Li joined the Computational Image Analysis Club at Northwestern University, which aims to help biological and chemical researchers apply computational methods to interpret imaging data and design molecular imaging techniques.

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• Jun 29 2023   The research article "A magnetic assembly approach to chiral superstructures" was online in the journal Science. Please read the UCR news release "Chemists develop new method to create chiral structures" for brief introduction. 

       News release: Magnetically directing chiral assembly/AAAS

                               Innovative Applications For Sensing And Anti-Counterfeit Technologies/VERVE TIMES

                               A New Way of Establishing Chiral Structures/AZO MATERIALS

                               Chemists develop new chiral structure creation method/TECH EXPLORIST

                               化学者がキラル構造を作る新しい方法を開発/Tii技術情報

                               Applications in sensing and anti-counterfeiting technology/ASKBYGEEKS

                               Chemists develop new method to create chiral structures/ScienceDaily

                               手性上部结构的磁组装方法/科学网

                               Embracing Technology In Sensing And Counterfeit Detection/SWIFTTELECAST

                               Chemists develop new method to create chiral structures/EurekAlert

                               Chemists develop new method to create chiral structures​​

                               SCIENMAG/Bioengineer/PHYS ORG/MIRAGE/

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• May 22 2023   Dr. Li's research article "A magnetic assembly approach to chiral superstructures" was accepted as a research article in Science. Many thanks to the AAAS editor for editing the manuscript and reviewers for providing helpful comments. We are excited about the discovery of quadrupole chiral field in permanent magnets and its capability in creating chiral superstructures from achiral molecules of any chemical compositions and length scales.

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2022                                              ​

• Dec 05 2022   Dr. Li's invited review paper "Smart Nanostructured Materials for SARS-CoV-2 and Variants Prevention, Biosensing and Vaccination" was published in Biosensors. 

 

• Nov 30 2022   "Postdoc Fellow Zhiwei Li Draws Inspiration from Nature to Create Smart Nanostructured Materials". Dr. Li received an interview from the Northwestern University (NU) International Institute for Nanotechnology (IIN) to talk about his motivation in research. ​

 

• Aug 04 2022   Dr. Li developed an advanced in vivo bioimaging technique by combining materials science with computer coding. It allows automatic search and screen of signals of responsive imaging contrast agents in a real time fashion. Relevant work was published in Nano letters and ACS nano. 

 

• Aug 01 2022   Dr. Li was selected as the inaugural recipient of the Richard P. Van Duyne Postdoctoral Fellowship by the Northwestern University (NU) International Institute for Nanotechnology (IIN).

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• Mar 07 2022   Dr. Li was awarded as an outstanding reviewer for Journal of Materials Chemistry C for significant contributions to the journal based on the number, timeliness and quality of the reports over the last 12 months.

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• Feb 04 2022   Dr. Li received an interview and was selected as thought leader by AZO ROBOTICS to recognize his contribution to developing adaptive soft robotics. 

 

• Feb 14 2022   Dr. Li's photonic crystal image was selected as one of Science in pictures by Advanced Science News. Crystals light up! 

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• Jan 27 2022   Dr. Li's research work "Multicolor Photonic Pigments for Rotation‐Asymmetric Mechanochromic Devices" was published in Advanced Materials and featured on the Frontispiece. 

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2021                            ​

• Dec 01 2021   Dr. Li's research article "Light-powered soft steam engines for self-adaptive oscillation and biomimetic swimming" was published in Science Robotics. 

       News release: Soft robots can work for oil spill remediation/DIGITAL JOURNAL

                               Light-Powered Robot Decontaminates on Water’s Surface/PHOTONIC MEDIA

                               水蒸気を燃料に、水面で動くロボット　海上の掃除や汚染物質の除去などに期待

                               Soft “Steam Engines” Powered by Light/OPTICS&PHOTONIC NEWS

                               Door licht aangedreven zachte robots zuigen gelekte olie op

                               Solar-Powered Robots That Could Clean Up Oil Spills/labroots

                               Water-strider-inspired robot may one day clean up oil spills/NEW ATLAS

                               These Light-Powered Soft Robots Can Clean Up Ocean Water/Wonderful Engineering

                               Light-powered soft robots could suck up oil spills

                               SPACE DAILY/MIRAGE/Nanowerk/ScienceDaily/PressReleasePoint

                               Tech Xplore/Newswise

 

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• Nov 08 2021   Dr. Li's review article "Colloidal self-assemble approach to smart nanostructured materials" was published in Chemical Reviews and featured on cover. Thanks to all contributing authors!

 

• Sep 15 2021   Dr. Li was invited to organize a research topic in the Journal Frontiers in Chemistry together with Prof. Le He and Prof. Jingbing Zeng and contributed an editorial to the Journal. 

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• Sep 14 2021   Dr. Li's research work "Creation and Reconstruction of Thermochromic Au Nanorods with Surface Concavity" was published in Journal of American Chemical Society. 

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• Sep 10 2021   Dr. Li's research work on magnetic assembly of nanorods into tetragonal colloidal crystals was published in Science Advances. Thanks for the contribution from all the authors! In this work, a new type of size-dependent magnetic interaction was recognized between nanoscale magnets, which was different from the magnetic dipole-dipole attraction firstly described since 1926. Read more: "Coupling morphological and magnetic anisotropy for assembling tetragonal colloidal crystals"

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• Apr 14 2021   Dr. Li contributed to a review article published in Chemical Society Reviews. Congratulations to all the authors on this excellent work! It was featured as a cover paper: "From colloidal particles to photonic crystals: advances in self-assembly and their emerging applications"

 

• Mar 29 2021   Dr. Li won the the BioSciTech Presentation Competition! This competition aims to seek advanced nanotechniques for biopreservation. See the ATP-Bio for more information.

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2020

• Jun 08 2020   Dr. Li's research article "Coupling magnetic and plasmonic anisotropy in hybrid nanorods for mechanochromic responses" was published in Nature Communications. 

       News release: Nanomaterial gives robots chameleon skin/EurekAlert 

                                Nanomaterial gives robots chameleon skin/SCIENMAG

                                Nanomaterial gives robots chameleon skin/nanowerk

                                Color-changing film could give robots chameleon-like skin/NEW ATLAS

                                Nanomaterial gives robots chameleon skin/PHYS ORG

                                Nanomaterial gives robots chameleon skin/ScienceDaily

                                Nanomaterial gives robots chameleon skin/7thSpace

                                Nanomaterial gives robots chameleon skin/UCR News

                                Chameleon skin (nanomaterial made of gold nanoparticles) for robots/FrogHeart​

 

• Jun 08 2020   Dr Li's wrote a story behind the nature communications paper. The story "Creating order out of chaos: magnetic alignment makes plasmonic nanostructures shine" was released in Nature Porfilio. 

 

• Apr 30 2020   Dr. Li's reviewed recent research activities in colloidal assembly and active tuning of coupled plasmonic nanospheres and published an Opinion in Trends in Chemistry. It was featured as a cover article.  ​

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• Apr 28 2020   Dr. Li received the 2019 Chinese Government Award for Outstanding Self-Financed Students Abroad, which was established by the China Scholarship Council (CSC) in 2003. Among all Chinese overseas graduate students, only 500 are awarded each year globally to recognize their great contributions to scientific research and outstanding accomplishments in academia.

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2019

• Dec 13 2019   Dr. Li was awarded a Ph.D. degree in Physical Chemistry from the University of California Riverside. LET THERE BE LIGHT!

 

• Jul 04 2019   Zhiwei's review article "Smart Materials by Nanoscale Magnetic Assembly" was published in Advanced Functional Materials and featured as a cover article. This Review summarizes the recent research progress on nanoscale magnetic assembly approaches toward the development of smart materials, such as photonic crystals, active plasmonic nanostructures, and soft robotics. 

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• May 01 2019   Zhiwei was selected to receive a Dissertation Year Program Fellowship from the Chemistry Department at the University of California Riverside. Keep going!

 

• Feb 18 2019   Zhiwei's review article "Stimuli-Responsive Optical Nanomaterials" was published in Advanced Materials. It provides a comprehensive overview of existing working principles in developing responsive optical nanomaterials within the regime of optical diffraction, absorption, refraction, and light emission. ​