In borophene, boundaries are no barrier

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Rice, Northwestern researchers make and test atom-thick boron’s unique domainsA scanning electron microscope image (top) shows two periodic assemblies of borophene, a synthetic, two-dimensional array of boron atoms, that join at a line defect. Computational models in the middle and bottom images correspond to the regions, with 1-to-6 borophene in red and 1-to-5 in blue. Researchers at Rice and Northwestern universities determined that phases of borophene line up in such a way that the material's conductive, metallic nature is maintained. (Credit: Graphics by Luqing Wang/Rice University)

The research led by Rice materials theorist Boris Yakobson and Northwestern materials scientist Mark Hersam appears in Nature Materials.

Borophene differs from graphene and other 2D materials in an important way: It doesn’t appear in nature. When graphene was discovered, it was famously yanked from a piece of graphite with Scotch tape. But semiconducting bulk boron doesn’t have layers, so all borophene is synthetic. Also unlike graphene, in which atoms connect to form chicken wire-like hexagons, borophene forms as linked triangles. Periodically, atoms go missing from the grid and leave hexagonal vacancies. The labs investigated forms of borophene with “hollow hexagon” concentrations of one per every five triangles and one per every six in the lattice.

Yakobson and Hersam also co-authored a recent Nature Nanotechnology perspective about “the lightest 2D metal.”In that piece, the authors suggested borophene may be ideal for flexible and transparent electronic interconnects, electrodes and displays. It could also be suitable for superconducting quantum interference devices and, when stacked, for hydrogen storage and battery applications.

– See more at Rice News

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