Molecular Engineering of Functional Inorganic and Hybrid Materials

For 25 years, Chemistry of Materials has been clearly providing a key forum to chemists, physicists, and engineers interested in materials preparation and characterization, in the search of unique physical properties and processing of innovative materials and devices. This short review presents a discussion on some recent advances in this field, illustrated with a few selected examples related to three of our main research areas: the synthesis of single nano-objects and the processing of porous and hierarchically structured materials and hybrid nanocomposite materials. A strong emphasis is also given to the need to realize a successful marriage between materials chemistry and smart processing. These cross-cutting approaches in the vein of bioinspired synthesis strategies are allowing the development of complex systems of various shapes with perfect mastery at different length scales of composition, structure, porosity, functionality, and morphology. These "integrative strategies", where all aspects of materials science are coupled, open a land of opportunities to tailor-made advanced inorganic and hybrid materials. Some of them are already impacting numerous societal concerns and industrial applications.