Photonic Inverse Opal‐Enabled Seamless Interface of Bilayer Structure for Color Regulation and Robust Passive Radiative Cooling

Colorful passive daytime radiative cooling has emerged as an attractive zero-energy-cooling technology that integrates aesthetic appeal with thermal management. However, achieving concurrent high cooling efficiency and mechanical robustness remains challenging, constrained either by the narrow solar reflection bandwidth and limited spectral tunability of monolayer photonic structures, or by interfacial heterogeneities in multilayer architectures. Here, we demonstrate a size-exclusion-assisted selective infiltration strategy for fabricating structurally colored daytime radiative cooling (SCDRC) sheets. A polymer phase exhibiting negligible solar absorption and high infrared emissivity permeates preassembled colloidal crystal templates, forming an ordered inverse opal layer upon etching, whereas microscale boron nitride platelets selectively excluded from the template organize into a packed solar-reflective microstructure. The resulting SCDRC sheets display tunable colors through pore geometry control, achieving >96% solar reflectance, >94% mid-infrared emissivity, a sub-ambient temperature reduction of 7°C in outdoor environments, and an average cooling power reduction of 20.7% across diverse climatic zones in China. The photonic framework demonstrates exceptional stability under prolonged thermal and humidity exposure, guaranteeing persistent coloration and cooling performance. This seamless-interface bilayer fabrication strategy establishes a viable platform for developing durable colored cooling materials integrating aesthetic appeal with energy-saving functionality, showing significant potential for advanced architectural and industrial applications.

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Publication Details

Journal
Advanced Materials
Published
2026-01-20
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1002/adma.202522922
Primary Topic
Thermal Radiation and Cooling Technologies
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00

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article

Photonic Inverse Opal‐Enabled Seamless Interface of Bilayer Structure for Color Regulation and Robust Passive Radiative Cooling

Fei Song, Xin‐jun Li, Long‐Xiang You, Xu‐Lin Yang et al.
Advanced Materials
Thermal Radiation and Cooling Technologies
article

Photonic Inverse Opal‐Enabled Seamless Interface of Bilayer Structure for Color Regulation and Robust Passive Radiative Cooling

Fei Song, Xin‐jun Li, Long‐Xiang You, Xu‐Lin Yang, Yu‐Zhong Wang, Bo Tang, Jia‐Bin Wei
article en

Abstract

Colorful passive daytime radiative cooling has emerged as an attractive zero-energy-cooling technology that integrates aesthetic appeal with thermal management. However, achieving concurrent high cooling efficiency and mechanical robustness remains challenging, constrained either by the narrow solar reflection bandwidth and limited spectral tunability of monolayer photonic structures, or by interfacial heterogeneities in multilayer architectures. Here, we demonstrate a size-exclusion-assisted selective infiltration strategy for fabricating structurally colored daytime radiative cooling (SCDRC) sheets. A polymer phase exhibiting negligible solar absorption and high infrared emissivity permeates preassembled colloidal crystal templates, forming an ordered inverse opal layer upon etching, whereas microscale boron nitride platelets selectively excluded from the template organize into a packed solar-reflective microstructure. The resulting SCDRC sheets display tunable colors through pore geometry control, achieving >96% solar reflectance, >94% mid-infrared emissivity, a sub-ambient temperature reduction of 7°C in outdoor environments, and an average cooling power reduction of 20.7% across diverse climatic zones in China. The photonic framework demonstrates exceptional stability under prolonged thermal and humidity exposure, guaranteeing persistent coloration and cooling performance. This seamless-interface bilayer fabrication strategy establishes a viable platform for developing durable colored cooling materials integrating aesthetic appeal with energy-saving functionality, showing significant potential for advanced architectural and industrial applications.

Advanced MaterialsVol. 38(12)
Ingenierie des Materiaux polymeres (FR)
National Natural Science Foundation of China, Higher Education Discipline Innovation Project, Fundamental Research Funds for the Central Universities
Openalex Percentile: Top 82%
Thermal Radiation and Cooling Technologies
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