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The plasmonic behavior of metals at the nanoscale is not only appealing for fundamental studies, but also very useful for the development of innovative photonic devices. The past few decades have witnessed great progress in colloidal synthesis of monodisperse metal nanoparticles with defined shapes. This has significantly fueled up the research of directing the metal nanoparticles to self-assemble into tailored extended structures, especially low dimensional ones, for a better control and manipulation of the interactions of the metal nanoparticles with light. In parallel, theories for a better description of nanoplasmonics have been increasingly developed and improved. Thus, the present review is focused on the overview of current experimental and theoretical developments in the directed self-assembly of metal nanoparticles with tailored plasmonic properties, which, hopefully, will provide useful guidelines for future research studies and applications of nanoplasmonics.

Injectable, thermoresponsive hydrogels are promising candidates for the delivery, maintenance and controlled release of adoptive cell therapies. Therefore, there is significant interest in the development of cytocompatible and biodegradable thermoresponsive hydrogels with appropriate gelling characteristics. Towards this end, a series of thermoresponsive copolymers consisting of poly(caprolactone) (PCL), poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) and poly(propylene glycol) (PPG) segments, with various PEG:PPG ratios, were synthesised via ring-opening polymerisation (ROP) of ε-caprolactone and epoxy-functionalised PEG and PPG derivatives. The resultant PCL–PEG–PPG copolymers were characterised via proton nuclear magnetic resonance (1H NMR) spectroscopy, gel permeation chromatography (GPC) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). The thermoresponsive characteristics of the aqueous copolymer solutions at various concentrations was investigated using the inversion method. Whilst all of the copolymers displayed thermoresponsive properties, the copolymer with a ratio of 1:2 PEG:PPG exhibited an appropriate sol–gel transition (28 °C) at a relatively low concentration (10 wt%), and remained a gel at 37 °C. Furthermore, the copolymers were shown to be enzymatically degradable in the presence of lipases and could be used for the encapsulation of CD4+ T-cell lymphocytes. These results demonstrate that the thermoresponsive PCL–PEG–PPG hydrogels may be suitable for use as an adoptive cell therapy (ACT) delivery vehicle.

Surface-inactive, highly hydrophilic particles are utilized to effectively and reversibly stabilize oil-in-water emulsions. This is a result of attractive van der Waals forces between particles and oil droplets in water, which are sufficient to trap the particles in close proximity to oil-water interfaces when repulsive forces between particles and oil droplets are suppressed. The emulsifying efficiency of the highly hydrophilic particles is determined by van der Waals attraction between particle monolayer shells and oil droplets enclosed therein and is inversely proportional to the particle size, while their stabilizing efficiency is determined by van der Waals attraction between single particles and oil droplets, which is proportional to the particle size. This differentiation in mechanism between emulsification and stabilization will significantly advance our knowledge of emulsions, thus enabling better control and design of emulsion-based technologies in practice.