Intercorrelated In-Plane and Out-of-Plane Ferroelectricity in Ultrathin Two-Dimensional Layered Semiconductor In2Se3

Chaojie Cui; Wei-Jin Hu; Xingxu Yan; Christopher Addiego; Wenpei Gao; Yao Wang; Zhe Wang; Linze Li; Yingchun Cheng; Peng Li; Xixiang Zhang; Husam N Alshareef; Tom Wu; Wenguang Zhu; Xiaoqing Pan; Lain-Jong Li

doi:10.1021/acs.nanolett.7b04852

Intercorrelated In-Plane and Out-of-Plane Ferroelectricity in Ultrathin Two-Dimensional Layered Semiconductor In₂Se₃

Nano Lett. 2018 Feb 14;18(2):1253-1258. doi: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.7b04852. Epub 2018 Feb 5.

Authors

Chaojie Cui¹, Wei-Jin Hu^{1

2}, Xingxu Yan³, Christopher Addiego⁴, Wenpei Gao³, Yao Wang⁵, Zhe Wang⁶, Linze Li³, Yingchun Cheng⁵, Peng Li¹, Xixiang Zhang¹, Husam N Alshareef¹, Tom Wu¹, Wenguang Zhu⁶, Xiaoqing Pan^{3

4}, Lain-Jong Li^{1

7}

Affiliations

¹ Physical Sciences and Engineering Division, King Abdullah University of Science and Technology , Thuwal, Jeddah 23955-6900, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia.
² Shenyang National Laboratory for Materials Science, Institute of Metal Research (IMR), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) , Shenyang 110016, China.
³ Department of Chemical Engineering and Materials Science, University of California - Irvine , Irvine, California 92697, America.
⁴ Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of California - Irvine , Irvine, California 92697, America.
⁵ Key Laboratory of Flexible Electronics and Institute of Advanced Materials, Jiangsu National Synergetic Innovation Center for Advanced Materials, Nanjing Tech University , Nanjing, Jiangsu 211816, China.
⁶ ICQD, Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at the Microscale, Synergetic Innovation Center of Quantum Information and Quantum Physics, and Key Laboratory of Strongly-Coupled Quantum Matter Physics (CAS), University of Science and Technology of China , Hefei, Anhui 230026, China.
⁷ Corporate Research and Chief Technology Office, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Hsinchu 30075, Taiwan.

PMID: 29378142
DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.7b04852

Abstract

Enriching the functionality of ferroelectric materials with visible-light sensitivity and multiaxial switching capability would open up new opportunities for their applications in advanced information storage with diverse signal manipulation functions. We report experimental observations of robust intralayer ferroelectricity in two-dimensional (2D) van der Waals layered α-In₂Se₃ ultrathin flakes at room temperature. Distinct from other 2D and conventional ferroelectrics, In₂Se₃ exhibits intrinsically intercorrelated out-of-plane and in-plane polarization, where the reversal of the out-of-plane polarization by a vertical electric field also induces the rotation of the in-plane polarization. On the basis of the in-plane switchable diode effect and the narrow bandgap (∼1.3 eV) of ferroelectric In₂Se₃, a prototypical nonvolatile memory device, which can be manipulated both by electric field and visible light illumination, is demonstrated for advancing data storage technologies.

Keywords: 2D materials; In2Se3; ferroelectric; semiconductor; switchable diode.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.