A Korean team of scientists tune black phosphorus' band gap to form a superior conductor, allowing for the application to be mass produced for electronic and optoelectronics devices.
The research team from Pohang University of Science and Technology (POSTECH), affiliated with the Institute for Basic Science's (IBS) Center for Artificial Low Dimensional Electronic Systems (CALDES), reported a tunable band gap in BP, effectively modifying the semiconducting material into a unique state of matter with anisotropic dispersion. This research outcome potentially allows for great flexibility in the design and optimization of electronic and optoelectronic devices like solar panels and telecommunication lasers.
To truly understand the significance of the team's findings, it's instrumental to understand the nature of two-dimensional (2-D) materials, and for that one must go back to 2010 when the world of 2-D materials was dominated by a simple thin sheet of carbon, a layered form of carbon atoms constructed to resemble honeycomb, called graphene. Graphene was globally heralded as a wonder-material thanks to the work of two British scientists who won the Nobel Prize for Physics for their research on it.
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