Nanoscale Polymorph Engineering of Metal-Correlated Insulator Junctions in Monolayer NbSe2

Yaoyao Chen, Yi Xin Dai, Yu Zhang*, Can Zhang, Lili Zhou, Liangguang Jia, Wei Wang, Xu Han, Hui Xia Yang, Liwei Liu, Chen Si, Qing Feng Sun*, Ye Liang Wang*

*Corresponding author for this work

Research output: Contribution to journalArticlepeer-review

Abstract

Lateral junctions composed of quantum many-body materials are highly desirable for realizing physical phenomena and device concepts. However, controllable fabrication of high-quality junctions is challenging, which greatly hinders further exploration. Here, we successfully realize monolayer heterophase homojunctions of metallic H-NbSe2 and correlated insulating T-NbSe2 with atomically sharp boundaries via nanoscale polymorph engineering. By applying a scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) tip pulse, T-NbSe2 can be locally introduced from H-NbSe2 on the side beneath the tip, thus realizing H/T-NbSe2 heterophase homojunctions. Our in situ STM measurements, complementary by the theoretical calculations, reveal two types of atomically sharp boundaries with distinct abilities for electron transmission, owing to the structure-dependent boundary coupling effects. Moreover, there are significant electronic interactions among the metallic, correlated insulating, and charge-density-wave states at the H/T-NbSe2 boundaries. Our results provide insight into the interacting mechanism among diverse quantum many-body states.

Original languageEnglish
Pages (from-to)14808-14816
Number of pages9
JournalACS Nano
Volume19
Issue number15
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 22 Apr 2025

Keywords

  • charge-density-wave
  • electron correlation
  • heterophase homojunction
  • polymorph engineering
  • scanning tunneling microscopy

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