The advancement of ion transport applications will require the development of functional materials with a high ionic conductivity that is stable, scalable, and micro-patternable. We report unusually high ionic conductivity of Li+, Na+, and K+ in 2D MoS2 nanofilm exceeding 1 S/cm, which is more than 2 orders of magnitude higher when compared to that of conventional solid ionic materials. The high ion conductivity of different cations can be explained by the mitigated activation energy via percolative ion channels in 2H-MoS2, including the 1D ion channel at the grain boundary, as confirmed by modeling and analysis. We obtain field-effect modulation of ion transport with a high on/off ratio. The ion channel is large-scale patternable by conventional lithography, and the thickness can be tuned down to a single atomic layer. The findings yield insight into the ion transport mechanism of van der Waals solid materials and guide the development of future ionic devices owing to the facile and scalable device fabrication with superionic conductivity.
Keywords: grain boundary; ion transport; ionic gate modulation; polycrystalline MoS2; superionic conductance.