From low-dimensional materials to complex superstructures: A review and outlook

Abstract

Low-dimensional materials have attracted increasing attention due to their guiding significance for material preparation and potential wide-ranging applications. Through the controllable synthesis and suitably designed fusion of low-dimensional materials into ordered complex superstructures, it has become an effective way to explore new properties of materials and construct structures meeting new application needs. Based on low-dimensional materials such as metal oxides, copolymers, metal-organic complexes, and organic crystals, great efforts have been devoted to the design and construction of complex superstructures with regular repeatability. A series of unique cases including multi-block, core/multi-shell, hyperbranched and network structures have been reported, which has promoted the development of the field of material preparation. Herein, we summarize representative progress of low-dimensional complex superstructures in a reasonable structure classification manner. Ultimately, the existing challenges are discussed, and an outlook is given for future study of precise construction of superstructures as well as exploitation of potential applications.

Keywords

• low-dimensional materials
• complex superstructures
• structural composite
• designable fabrication
• functional application