Step engineering for nucleation and domain orientation control in WSe2 epitaxy on c-plane sapphire

Haoyue Zhu; Nadire Nayir; Tanushree H. Choudhury; Anushka Bansal; Benjamin Huet; Kunyan Zhang; Alexander A. Puretzky; Saiphaneendra Bachu; Krystal York; Thomas V. Mc Knight; Nicholas Trainor; Aaryan Oberoi; Ke Wang; Saptarshi Das; Robert A. Makin; Steven M. Durbin; Shengxi Huang; Nasim Alem; Vincent H. Crespi; Adri C.T. van Duin; Joan M. Redwing

doi:10.1038/s41565-023-01456-6

Step engineering for nucleation and domain orientation control in WSe₂ epitaxy on c-plane sapphire

Haoyue Zhu, Nadire Nayir, Tanushree H. Choudhury, Anushka Bansal, Benjamin Huet, Kunyan Zhang, Alexander A. Puretzky, Saiphaneendra Bachu, Krystal York, Thomas V. Mc Knight, Nicholas Trainor, Aaryan Oberoi, Ke Wang, Saptarshi Das, Robert A. Makin, Steven M. Durbin, Shengxi Huang, Nasim Alem, Vincent H. Crespi, Adri C.T. van DuinJoan M. Redwing

Functional Hybrid Nanomaterials

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article › peer-review

32 Scopus citations

Abstract

Epitaxial growth of two-dimensional transition metal dichalcogenides on sapphire has emerged as a promising route to wafer-scale single-crystal films. Steps on the sapphire act as sites for transition metal dichalcogenide nucleation and can impart a preferred domain orientation, resulting in a substantial reduction in mirror twins. Here we demonstrate control of both the nucleation site and unidirectional growth direction of WSe₂ on c-plane sapphire by metal–organic chemical vapour deposition. The unidirectional orientation is found to be intimately tied to growth conditions via changes in the sapphire surface chemistry that control the step edge location of WSe₂ nucleation, imparting either a 0° or 60° orientation relative to the underlying sapphire lattice. The results provide insight into the role of surface chemistry on transition metal dichalcogenide nucleation and domain alignment and demonstrate the ability to engineer domain orientation over wafer-scale substrates.

Original language	English
Pages (from-to)	1295-1302
Number of pages	8
Journal	Nature Nanotechnology
Volume	18
Issue number	11
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-023-01456-6
State	Published - Nov 2023

Funding

The work was financially supported by the National Science Foundation (NSF) through the Pennsylvania State University 2D Crystal Consortium–Materials Innovation Platform (2DCC-MIP) under NSF cooperative agreement numbers DMR-1539916 and DMR-2039351. S.B. and N.A. acknowledge support provided by NSF Career grant number DMR-1654107. T.V.M. and J.M.R. acknowledge support from the Defense Technical Information Center under award number FA9550-21-1-0460. N.T. acknowledges support from the NSF Graduate Research Fellowship Program under grant number DGE1255832. K.Z. and S.H. acknowledge support from NSF under grant numbers ECCS-1943895 and ECCS-2246564 and Air Force Office of Scientific Research under grant number FA9550-22-1-0408. SHG measurements were supported by the Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS), which is a US Department of Energy Office of Science User Facility at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.

Funders	Funder number
Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences
National Science Foundation
Air Force Office of Scientific Research	FA9550-22-1-0408
Office of Science
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Pennsylvania State University	DMR-1654107, DMR-1539916, DMR-2039351
Defense Technical Information Center	DGE1255832, FA9550-21-1-0460, ECCS-1943895, ECCS-2246564

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Zhu, H., Nayir, N., Choudhury, T. H., Bansal, A., Huet, B., Zhang, K., Puretzky, A. A., Bachu, S., York, K., Mc Knight, T. V., Trainor, N., Oberoi, A., Wang, K., Das, S., Makin, R. A., Durbin, S. M., Huang, S., Alem, N., Crespi, V. H., ... Redwing, J. M. (2023). Step engineering for nucleation and domain orientation control in WSe₂ epitaxy on c-plane sapphire. Nature Nanotechnology, 18(11), 1295-1302. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-023-01456-6

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title = "Step engineering for nucleation and domain orientation control in WSe2 epitaxy on c-plane sapphire",

abstract = "Epitaxial growth of two-dimensional transition metal dichalcogenides on sapphire has emerged as a promising route to wafer-scale single-crystal films. Steps on the sapphire act as sites for transition metal dichalcogenide nucleation and can impart a preferred domain orientation, resulting in a substantial reduction in mirror twins. Here we demonstrate control of both the nucleation site and unidirectional growth direction of WSe2 on c-plane sapphire by metal–organic chemical vapour deposition. The unidirectional orientation is found to be intimately tied to growth conditions via changes in the sapphire surface chemistry that control the step edge location of WSe2 nucleation, imparting either a 0° or 60° orientation relative to the underlying sapphire lattice. The results provide insight into the role of surface chemistry on transition metal dichalcogenide nucleation and domain alignment and demonstrate the ability to engineer domain orientation over wafer-scale substrates.",

author = "Haoyue Zhu and Nadire Nayir and Choudhury, {Tanushree H.} and Anushka Bansal and Benjamin Huet and Kunyan Zhang and Puretzky, {Alexander A.} and Saiphaneendra Bachu and Krystal York and {Mc Knight}, {Thomas V.} and Nicholas Trainor and Aaryan Oberoi and Ke Wang and Saptarshi Das and Makin, {Robert A.} and Durbin, {Steven M.} and Shengxi Huang and Nasim Alem and Crespi, {Vincent H.} and {van Duin}, {Adri C.T.} and Redwing, {Joan M.}",

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year = "2023",

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Zhu, H, Nayir, N, Choudhury, TH, Bansal, A, Huet, B, Zhang, K, Puretzky, AA, Bachu, S, York, K, Mc Knight, TV, Trainor, N, Oberoi, A, Wang, K, Das, S, Makin, RA, Durbin, SM, Huang, S, Alem, N, Crespi, VH, van Duin, ACT & Redwing, JM 2023, 'Step engineering for nucleation and domain orientation control in WSe₂ epitaxy on c-plane sapphire', Nature Nanotechnology, vol. 18, no. 11, pp. 1295-1302. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-023-01456-6

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AU - Trainor, Nicholas

AU - Oberoi, Aaryan

AU - Wang, Ke

AU - Das, Saptarshi

AU - Makin, Robert A.

AU - Durbin, Steven M.

AU - Huang, Shengxi

AU - Alem, Nasim

AU - Crespi, Vincent H.

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Step engineering for nucleation and domain orientation control in WSe₂ epitaxy on c-plane sapphire

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