Nature and Chinese Art Inspire Materials for Light Harvesting

Abstract

The Holy Grail of materials science and engineering is to understand and control structure-property relationships in materials systems, so as to attain the long-standing goal of materials by design. In this Preview, we describe recently synthesized hollow multi-shelled structures (HoMSs), a porous nanomaterial whose complex architecture was inspired both by nature and by the puzzle ball-an ancient Chinese artifact. Thanks to the precise control of structure and composition, HoMSs allow to sequentially harvest sunlight, leading to improved photocatalytic activity for hydrogen production from water.