Experimental realization of honeycomb borophene

Wenbin Li; Longjuan Kong; Caiyun Chen; Jian Gou; Shaoxiang Sheng; Weifeng Zhang; Hui Li; Lan Chen; Peng Cheng; Kehui Wu

doi:10.1016/j.scib.2018.02.006

Experimental realization of honeycomb borophene

Sci Bull (Beijing). 2018 Mar 15;63(5):282-286. doi: 10.1016/j.scib.2018.02.006. Epub 2018 Feb 5.

Authors

Wenbin Li¹, Longjuan Kong¹, Caiyun Chen¹, Jian Gou¹, Shaoxiang Sheng¹, Weifeng Zhang², Hui Li³, Lan Chen⁴, Peng Cheng⁵, Kehui Wu⁶

Affiliations

¹ Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China; School of Physical Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China.
² School of Physics and Electronics, Henan University, Kaifeng 475004, China.
³ Beijing Advanced Innovation Center for Soft Matter Science and Engineering, Beijing University of Chemical Technology, Beijing 100029, China.
⁴ Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China; School of Physical Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China. Electronic address: lchen@iphy.ac.cn.
⁵ Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China; School of Physical Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China. Electronic address: pcheng@iphy.ac.cn.
⁶ Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China; School of Physical Sciences, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100049, China; Collaborative Innovation Center of Quantum Matter, Beijing 100871, China. Electronic address: khwu@iphy.ac.cn.

PMID: 36658797
DOI: 10.1016/j.scib.2018.02.006

Abstract

We report the successful preparation of a purely honeycomb, graphene-like borophene, by using an Al(1 1 1) surface as the substrate and molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) growth in ultrahigh vacuum. Scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) images reveal perfect monolayer borophene with planar, non-buckled honeycomb lattice similar as graphene. Theoretical calculations show that the honeycomb borophene on Al(1 1 1) is energetically stable. Remarkably, nearly one electron charge is transferred to each boron atom from the Al(1 1 1) substrate and stabilizes the honeycomb borophene structure, in contrast to the negligible charge transfer in case of borophene/Ag(1 1 1). The existence of honeycomb 2D allotrope is important to the basic understanding of boron chemistry, and it also provides an ideal platform for fabricating boron-based materials with intriguing electronic properties such as Dirac states.

Keywords: 2D materials; Borophene; Honeycomb structure.