In a new report published in Science, Yi-Lun Hong and
a group of research scientists in materials science, engineering,
and advanced technology in China and the U.K. investigated
two-dimensional (2-D) materials to discover new phenomena and
unusual properties. The team introduced elemental silicon during
chemical vapor deposition-based growth of molybdenum nitride to
passivate its surface and develop centimeter-scale, monolayer
nitride films with silicon such as MoSi2N4. They built the
monolayer film with seven atomic layers in the order of
nitrogen-silicon-nitrogen-molybdenum-nitrogen-silicon-nitrogen
(N-Si-N-Mo-N-Si-N), and the resulting material showed
semiconducting behavior and excellent stability under ambient
conditions. Using density functional theory (DFT) calculations, the
scientists predicted a large family of such monolayer structured
2-D materials to exist with useful applications as semiconductors,
metals and magnetic half-metals.
