A healing squeeze: The very long molecules found in synthetic polymers, and their tendency to entangle and partially crystallize, impart many of the polymers' useful properties. However, these same characteristics also mean that chain dynamics are slow, which impedes potential self-healing. Yanagisawa et al. developed a family of ether-thiourea linear polymers that form hydrogen-bonded networks and still manage to stay amorphous. The polymers are stiff, showing the strength of the hydrogen bonding; however, because these bonds can easily reform, the polymer is also able to self-heal when compressed. Science , this issue p. 72

Controlled self-assembly of a trinitrofluorenone-appended gemini-shaped amphiphilic hexabenzocoronene selectively formed nanotubes or microfibers with different photochemical properties. In these nanotubes, which are 16 nanometers in diameter and several micrometers long, a molecular layer of electron-accepting trinitrofluorenone laminates an electron-donating graphitic layer of π-stacked hexabenzocoronene. The coaxial nanotubular structure allows photochemical generation of spatially separated charge carriers and a quick photoconductive response with a large on/off ratio greater than 10 ⁴ . In sharp contrast, the microfibers consist of a charge-transfer complex between the hexabenzocoronene and trinitrofluorenone parts and exhibit almost no photocurrent generation.

Popping open one by one into polymers: We rarely board airplanes by joining the back of a single well-ordered line. More often, we jostle around in one of several bulging crowds that merge haphazardly near the gate. Roughly speaking, these processes are analogous to the chain growth and step growth mechanisms of polymer assembly at the molecular level. Kang et al. present a strategy to link molecular building blocks through hydrogen bonding in accord with the well-controlled chain growth model. The molecules start out curled inward, as they engage in internal hydrogen bonding, until an initiator pulls one open; that molecule is then in the right conformation to pull a partner into the growing chain, poising it to pull in yet another, and so forth down the line. Science , this issue p. 646

A supramolecular self-assembly approach is used to make a nanotubular heterojunction.