A roundup of news from the past week in the materials science industry.
Vanadium dioxide holds the key to spintronic smart sensors
Researchs integrate vanadium oxide onto a silicon chip, paving the way for multifunctional spintronic smart sensors and next-generation spintronic devices.

Researchers capture photoactivation at the single-cell level
G. Han and co-workers have reported real-time recording of tuned upconversion nanoparticles mediating rapid photoactivation down to just a few cells.

Best of Advanced Optical Materials – Now online
Advanced Optical Materials has made a selection of the best articles from 2013 available to download for free.

Controlling light with light
A new approach to control light with light without the need for optical nonlinearity has been suggested by a Russian-British research group.

The new look of LPR: making the best of your work
Laser & Photonics Reviews has a new look! The first issue with new cover pages making full use of background covering pictures was released this month.

Polymer optics – the future of light modulation
Free access to the latest special issue of the Journal of Polymer Science: Polymer Physics, on polymer optics.
Most accessed papers in physica status solidi for November 2013
We present the most downloaded papers from the pss journal family from November.
Significant development in graphene synthesis
Researchers from MPI Mainz have succeeded in producing remarkably long, structurally well-defined and liquid-phase-processable graphene nanoribbons.

Book review: Carbon nanotubes and graphene for photonic applications
Mildred Dresselhaus reviews Carbon nanotubes and graphene for photonic applications, released this year by Woodhead Publishing.