Abstract

Abstract MXenes are an emerging family of highly-conductive 2D materials which have demonstrated state-of-the-art performance in electromagnetic interference shielding, chemical sensing, and energy storage. To further improve performance, there is a need to increase MXenes’ electronic conductivity. Tailoring the MXene surface chemistry could achieve this goal, as density functional theory predicts that surface terminations strongly influence MXenes' Fermi level density of states and thereby MXenes’ electronic conductivity. Here, we directly correlate MXene surface de-functionalization with increased electronic conductivity through in situ vacuum annealing, electrical biasing, and spectroscopic analysis within the transmission electron microscope. Furthermore, we show that intercalation can induce transitions between metallic and semiconductor-like transport (transitions from a positive to negative temperature-dependence of resistance) through inter-flake effects. These findings lay the groundwork for intercalation- and termination-engineered MXenes, which promise improved electronic conductivity and could lead to the realization of semiconducting, magnetic, and topologically insulating MXenes.

Keywords

MXenesMaterials scienceFermi levelIntercalation (chemistry)NanotechnologyDensity of statesConductivityCondensed matter physicsChemical physicsElectronChemistryPhysical chemistryPhysicsInorganic chemistry

Affiliated Institutions

Related Publications

Hybrid density functional study of structural and electronic properties of functionalized Ti<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mml:mrow><mml:msub><mml:mrow/><mml:mrow><mml:mi>n</mml:mi><mml:mo>+</mml:mo><mml:mn>1</mml:mn></mml:mrow></mml:msub><mml:msub><mml:mi>X</mml:mi><mml:mi>n</mml:mi></mml:msub></mml:mrow></mml:math>(<mml:math xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" display="inline"><mml:mrow><mml:mi>X</mml:mi><mml:mo>=</mml:mo><mml:mi mathvariant="normal">C</mml:mi></mml:mrow></mml:math>, N) monolayers

Yu Xie , Paul R. C. Kent

Density functional theory simulations with conventional (PBE) and hybrid (HSE06) functionals were performed to investigate the structural and electronic properties of MXene mono...

2013 Physical Review B 582 citations

Publication Info

Year
2019
Type
article
Volume
10
Issue
1
Pages
522-522
Citations
1160
Access
Closed

External Links

View on DOI.org

Social Impact

Altmetric
PlumX Metrics

Social media, news, blog, policy document mentions

Citation Metrics

1160
OpenAlex

Cite This

James L. Hart, Kanit Hantanasirisakul, Andrew C. Lang et al. (2019). Control of MXenes’ electronic properties through termination and intercalation. Nature Communications , 10 (1) , 522-522. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-018-08169-8

Identifiers

DOI
10.1038/s41467-018-08169-8