This review summarizes the recent advances in light-driven micro/nanomotors and highlights the challenges and perspectives toward environmental, biomedical and micro/nanoengineering applications.

The water-fuelled TiO ₂ /Pt Janus submicromotors under pulsed UV irradiation may aggregate and separate alternatively, performing a much higher photocatalytic activity than the aggregated counterparts due to the enhanced mass exchange with the surroundings.

We present a simple and effective heterogeneous contraction method to fabricate hollow spheres with controllable interior structures (ranging from solid, simple hollow to core-in-hollow-wall, double-wall hollow and core-in-double-hollow-wall spheres) by a non-equilibrium heat-treatment process of gel precursors with a high heating rate.