Graphene-Transition Metal Dichalcogenide Heterojunctions for Scalable and Low-Power Complementary Integrated Circuits

ACS Nano. 2020 Jan 28;14(1):985-992. doi: 10.1021/acsnano.9b08288. Epub 2020 Jan 8.

Abstract

The most pressing barrier for the development of advanced electronics based on two-dimensional (2D) layered semiconductors stems from the lack of site-selective synthesis of complementary n- and p-channels with low contact resistance. Here, we report an in-plane epitaxial route for the growth of interlaced 2D semiconductor monolayers using chemical vapor deposition with a gas-confined scheme, in which patterned graphene (Gr) serves as a guiding template for site-selective growth of Gr-WS2-Gr and Gr-WSe2-Gr heterostructures. The Gr/2D semiconductor interface exhibits a transparent contact with a nearly ideal pinning factor of 0.95 for the n-channel WS2 and 0.92 for the p-channel WSe2. The effective depinning of the Fermi level gives an ultralow contact resistance of 0.75 and 1.20 kΩ·μm for WS2 and WSe2, respectively. Integrated logic circuits including inverter, NAND gate, static random access memory, and five-stage ring oscillator are constructed using the complementary Gr-WS2-Gr-WSe2-Gr heterojunctions as a fundamental building block, featuring the prominent performance metrics of high operation frequency (>0.2 GHz), low-power consumption, large noise margins, and high operational stability. The technology presented here provides a speculative look at the electronic circuitry built on atomic-scale semiconductors in the near future.

Keywords: 2D materials; Schottky barrier; TMD; field-effect transistor; integrated circuit; logic gate.