Mineralisation of fibrillar collagen with biomimetic process-directing agents has enabled scientists to gain insight into the potential mechanisms involved in intrafibrillar mineralisation. Here, by using polycation- and polyanion-directed intrafibrillar mineralisation, we challenge the popular paradigm that electrostatic attraction is solely responsible for polyelectrolyte-directed intrafibrillar mineralisation. Because there is no difference when a polycationic or a polyanionic electrolyte is used to direct collagen mineralisation, we argue that additional types of long-range non-electrostatic interactions are responsible for intrafibrillar mineralisation. Molecular dynamics simulations of collagen structures in the presence of extrafibrillar polyelectrolytes show that the outward movement of ions and intrafibrillar water through the collagen surface occurs irrespective of the charges of polyelectrolytes, resulting in the experimentally verifiable contraction of the collagen structures. The need to balance electroneutrality and osmotic equilibrium simultaneously to establish Gibbs-Donnan equilibrium in a polyelectrolyte-directed mineralisation system establishes a new model for collagen intrafibrillar mineralisation that supplements existing collagen mineralisation mechanisms.

Carbon nanotubes (CNTs) were directly synthesized on flexible polymer substrates without damage of polymer by microwave irradiation. Cobalt was used as the catalysts, and the synthesis was done in the atmospheric pressure with an acetylene carbon source. Only 5 s was required for the synthesis of well-graphitized CNTs. Field emission measurements revealed that this flexible CNT field emitter array has a great potential for the flexible field emission displays (FEDs).

Anodic aluminum oxide (AAO) was used as substrates of microstructure fabrication. Complex structures with high aspect ratios were obtained by the single-step wet etching of the AAO substrates. Structures with different shapes and aspect ratios could be simultaneously obtained with vertical sidewalls. The surface morphology of the fabricated structures could be tailored. It is expected that various MEMS/NEMS devices can be built using this technique.

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