Despite remarkable progress in the development of halide perovskite materials and devices, their integration into nanoscale optoelectronics has been hindered by a lack of control over nanoscale patterning. Owing to their tendency to degrade rapidly, perovskites suffer from chemical incompatibility with conventional lithographic processes. Here, we present an alternative, bottom-up approach for precise and scalable formation of perovskite nanocrystal arrays with deterministic control over size, number, and position. In our approach, localized growth and positioning is guided using topographical templates of controlled surface wettability through which nanoscale forces are engineered to achieve sub-lithographic resolutions. With this technique, we demonstrate deterministic arrays of CsPbBr₃nanocrystals with tunable dimensions down to <50 nm and positional accuracy <50 nm. Versatile, scalable, and compatible with device integration processes, we then use our technique to demonstrate arrays of nanoscale light-emitting diodes, highlighting the new opportunities that this platform offers for perovskites’ integration into on-chip nanodevices.

A nanoscale on-chip light source with high intensity is desired for various applications in integrated photonics systems. However, it is challenging to realize such an emitter using materials and fabrication processes compatible with the standard integrated circuit technology. In this letter, we report an electrically driven Si light-emitting diode with sub-wavelength emission area fabricated in an open-foundry microelectronics complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor platform. The light-emitting diode emission spectrum is centered around 1100 nm and the emission area is smaller than 0.14 μm² (~ $$\varnothing 400$$∅ 400 nm). This light-emitting diode has high spatial intensity of >50 mW/cm² which is comparable with state-of-the-art Si-based emitters with much larger emission areas. Due to sub-wavelength confinement, the emission exhibits a high degree of spatial coherence, which is demonstrated by incorporating the light-emitting diode into a compact lensless in-line holographic microscope. This centimeter-scale, all-silicon microscope utilizes a single emitter to simultaneously illuminate ~9.5 million pixels of a complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor imager.

Decarbonizing food production and mitigating agriculture's environmental impact require new technologies for precise delivery of fertilizers and pesticides to plants. The cuticle, a waxy barrier that protects the surface of leaves, causes 60%–90% runoff of fertilizers and pesticides, leading to the wastage of intensive resources, soil depletion, and water bodies pollution. Solutions to mitigate runoff include adding chemicals (e.g., surfactants) to decrease surface tension and enhance cuticles' permeability but have low efficacy. In this study, vapor‐induced synergistic differentiation (VISDi) is used to nanomanufacture echinate pollen‐like, high payload content (≈50 wt%) microcapsules decorated with robust spines that mechanically disrupt the cuticle and adhere to the leaf. VISDi induces a core–shell structure in the spines, enabling the release of agrochemicals from the microparticles' body into the leaf. As proof of concept, precise and highthroughput delivery of iron fertilizer in Fe‐deficient spinach plants is demonstrated. Spray of spiny microparticles improves leaf adhesion by mechanical interlocking, reduces wash‐off by an ≈12.5 fold, and enhances chlorophyll content by ≈7.3 times compared to the application of spherical counterparts. Together, these results show that spiny microparticles can mitigate agricultural runoff and provide a high‐throughput tool for precise plant drug delivery.

Classical transport of electrons and holes in nanoscale devices leads to heating that severely limits performance, reliability, and efficiency. In contrast, recent theory suggests that interband quantum tunneling and subsequent thermalization of carriers with the lattice results in local cooling of devices. However, internal cooling in nanoscale devices is largely unexplored. Here, using a novel scanning thermal microscopy technique with millikelvin temperature resolution and nanometer spatial resolution, we directly record the cross-sectional temperature in functional InGaAs tunnel diodes. Our measurements reveal large, localized cooling of 2-3 W/cm^{2} at the tunnel junction, which is in quantitative agreement with the bipolar Peltier process associated with interband tunneling. These advances hold significant potential for integration into electronic and energy conversion devices and improving their performance.