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Lookup NU author(s): Dr Aleksey KozikovORCiD
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License (CC BY 4.0).
Weak interlayer interactions in van der Waals crystals facilitate their mechanical exfoliation to monolayer and few-layer two-dimensional materials, which often exhibit striking physical phenomena absent in their bulk form. Here we utilize mechanical exfoliation to produce a two-dimensional form of a mineral franckeite and show that the phase segregation of chemical species into discrete layers at the sub-nanometre scale facilitates franckeite’s layered structure and basal cleavage down to a single unit cell thickness. This behaviour is likely to be common in a wider family of complex minerals and could be exploited for a single-step synthesis of van der Waals heterostructures, as an alternative to artificial stacking of individual two-dimensional crystals. We demonstrate p-type electrical conductivity and remarkable electrochemical properties of the exfoliated crystals, showing promise for a range of applications, and use the density functional theory calculations of franckeite’s electronic band structure to rationalize the experimental results.
Author(s): Velicky M, Toth P, Rakowski A, Rooney A, Kozikov A, Woods C, Mishchenko A, Fumagalli L, Yin J, Zolyomi V, Georgiou T, Haigh S, Novoselov K, Dryfe R
Publication type: Article
Publication status: Published
Journal: Nature Communications
Year: 2017
Volume: 8
Online publication date: 13/02/2017
Acceptance date: 24/12/2016
Date deposited: 03/07/2020
ISSN (electronic): 2041-1723
Publisher: Nature Publishing Group
URL: https://doi.org/10.1038/ncomms14410
DOI: 10.1038/ncomms14410
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