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Alloy-buffer-controlled van der Waals epitaxial growth of aligned tellurene

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Abstract

Group-VI elemental two-dimensional (2D) materials (e.g., tellurene (Te)) have unique crystalline structures and extraordinarily physical properties. However, it still remains a great challenge to controllably grow 2D Te with good repeatability, uniformity, and highly aligned orientation using vapor growth method. Here, we design a Cu foil-assisted alloy-buffer-controlled growth method to epitaxially grow aligned single-crystalline 2D Te on an insulating mica substrate. The in-situ formation of Cu−Te alloy plays a key role on 2D Te growth, alleviating the spatial and temporal non-uniformity of precursor in conventional vapor deposition process. Through transmission electron microscopy (TEM) analysis combined with theoretical calculations, we unveil that the alignment growth of Te in the [110] direction is along the [600] direction of mica, owing to the small lattice mismatch (0.15%) and strong binding strength. This work presents a method to grow aligned high-quality 2D Te in a controllable manner.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the Research Grant Council of Hong Kong (No. PolyU 152053/18E) and the Shenzhen Science and Technology Innovation Commission (No. JCYJ20180507183424383).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Applied Physics, the Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong, 999077, China

    Cong Wang, Chao Xu, Xuyun Guo, Ning Zhang, Jianmin Yan, Jiewei Chen, Wei Yu, Ye Zhu & Yang Chai

  2. The Hong Kong Polytechnic University Shenzhen Research Institute, Shenzhen, 518057, China

    Cong Wang, Ning Zhang, Jianmin Yan, Jiewei Chen & Yang Chai

  3. School of Materials Science and Engineering, Harbin Institute of Technology (Shenzhen), Shenzhen, 518055, China

    **g-Kai Qin

  4. Department of Mechanical Engineering, the University of Hong Kong, Hong Kong, 999077, China

    Lain-Jong Li

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  1. Cong Wang
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  7. Wei Yu
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Correspondence to Yang Chai.

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Wang, C., Xu, C., Guo, X. et al. Alloy-buffer-controlled van der Waals epitaxial growth of aligned tellurene. Nano Res. 15, 5712–5718 (2022). https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-022-4188-7

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