After graphene, carbon nanocones are now an exciting form of carbon for material scientists. As the name suggests, they are conical structures made up of carbon, where graphene sheets are folded like a party cap with a height and diameter of a few nanometers (1 nanometer = 1/1,000,000,000th of a metre). With unique properties due to their conical shape, they have a wide range of applications, including being used as a tip of the probe of a high precision microscope used to record activity at an atomic level.

A team of researchers from Indian Institute of Science, Bengaluru, Université Paris-Saclay, Gif-sur-Yvette, France and Technische Universität München, Germany has provided a material design strategy for polycrystalline piezoelectrics that could achieve electrostrain values larger than 1%. The breakthrough could result in cheaper and efficient piezoelectric actuators.

Researchers from Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, Mumbai have observed a new phenomenon in a semiconductor quantum dot-- particles of nanometre (a billionth of a meter) size which are also called artificial atoms) made of Cu₂ZnSnS₄  (CZTS). By shining Ultra Violet (UV) light, on the quantum dots immersed in an electrolyte, they noticed an increase in its capacitance. The effect could be engineered to serve as photocapacitors- capacitors that are charged using light.

Indian Institute of Science (IISc), Bengaluru has for the third consecutive year, bagged the top rank in the National Institutional Ranking Framework (NIRF) which was announced by the Minister of Human Resource Development, Shri. Prakash Javadekar on 03 March 2018.