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Sahu TK, Kumar N, Chahal S, Jana R, Paul S, Mukherjee M, Tavabi AH, Datta A, Dunin-Borkowski RE, Valov I, Nayak A, Kumar P. Microwave synthesis of molybdenene from MoS 2. NATURE NANOTECHNOLOGY 2023; 18:1430-1438. [PMID: 37666941 PMCID: PMC10716048 DOI: 10.1038/s41565-023-01484-2] [Citation(s) in RCA: 0] [Impact Index Per Article: 0] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Key Words] [Grants] [Track Full Text] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 09/01/2021] [Accepted: 07/06/2023] [Indexed: 09/06/2023]
Abstract
Dirac materials are characterized by the emergence of massless quasiparticles in their low-energy excitation spectrum that obey the Dirac Hamiltonian. Known examples of Dirac materials are topological insulators, d-wave superconductors, graphene, and Weyl and Dirac semimetals, representing a striking range of fundamental properties with potential disruptive applications. However, none of the Dirac materials identified so far shows metallic character. Here, we present evidence for the formation of free-standing molybdenene, a two-dimensional material composed of only Mo atoms. Using MoS2 as a precursor, we induced electric-field-assisted molybdenene growth under microwave irradiation. We observe the formation of millimetre-long whiskers following screw-dislocation growth, consisting of weakly bonded molybdenene sheets, which, upon exfoliation, show metallic character, with an electrical conductivity of ~940 S m-1. Molybdenene when hybridized with two-dimensional h-BN or MoS2, fetch tunable optical and electronic properties. As a proof of principle, we also demonstrate applications of molybdenene as a surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy platform for molecular sensing, as a substrate for electron imaging and as a scanning probe microscope cantilever.
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Affiliation(s)
- Tumesh Kumar Sahu
- Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology Patna, Bihar, India
- Department of Physics, Shri Ramdeobaba College of Engineering and Management, Nagpur, India
| | - Nishant Kumar
- Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology Patna, Bihar, India
| | - Sumit Chahal
- Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology Patna, Bihar, India
| | - Rajkumar Jana
- School of Chemical Sciences, Indian Association of Cultivation of Science, Kolkata, India
| | - Sumana Paul
- School of Chemical Sciences, Indian Association of Cultivation of Science, Kolkata, India
| | - Moumita Mukherjee
- School of Chemical Sciences, Indian Association of Cultivation of Science, Kolkata, India
| | - Amir H Tavabi
- Ernst Ruska-Centre for Microscopy and Spectroscopy with Electrons and Peter Grünberg Institute, Forschungszentrum Jülich, Jülich, Germany
| | - Ayan Datta
- School of Chemical Sciences, Indian Association of Cultivation of Science, Kolkata, India
| | - Rafal E Dunin-Borkowski
- Ernst Ruska-Centre for Microscopy and Spectroscopy with Electrons and Peter Grünberg Institute, Forschungszentrum Jülich, Jülich, Germany
| | - Ilia Valov
- Peter Grünberg Institute (PGI-7), Forschungszentrum Jülich, Jülich, Germany.
- Institute of Electrochemistry and Energy Systems, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences, Sofia, Bulgaria.
| | - Alpana Nayak
- Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology Patna, Bihar, India.
| | - Prashant Kumar
- Department of Physics, Indian Institute of Technology Patna, Bihar, India.
- Global Innovative Centre for Advanced Nanomaterials, The University of Newcastle, Newcastle, New South Wales, Australia.
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