Enhancing the ambient stability of few-layer black phosphorus by surface modification

Shuang-Ying Lei; Hai-Yun Shen; Yi-Yang Sun; Neng Wan; Hong Yu; Shengbai Zhang

doi:10.1039/c8ra00560e

Enhancing the ambient stability of few-layer black phosphorus by surface modification

RSC Adv. 2018 Apr 18;8(26):14676-14683. doi: 10.1039/c8ra00560e. eCollection 2018 Apr 17.

Authors

Shuang-Ying Lei¹, Hai-Yun Shen¹, Yi-Yang Sun², Neng Wan¹, Hong Yu¹, Shengbai Zhang³

Affiliations

¹ Key Laboratory of Microelectromechanical Systems of the Ministry of Education, Southeast University Nanjing 210096 China lsy@seu.edu.cn.
² State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Sciences Shanghai 201899 China.
³ Department of Physics, Applied Physics, and Astronomy, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute Troy New York 12180 USA.

Abstract

Based on high-throughput density functional theory calculations, we investigated the adsorption characteristics of various elements across the Periodic Table on few-layer black phosphorus (BP). Using the criterion that the ratio of adsorption energy (E _ads) to bulk cohesive energy (E _coh) is greater than one (E _ads/E _coh > 1), we selected fifteen elements. The adsorption of these elements on few-layer BPs could significantly shift their conduction-band minimum (CBM) downward, suggesting the possibility of preventing the few-layer BPs from oxidation if the CBM can be shifted below the O₂/O₂ ^- redox potential. Our study offers an efficient approach to overcoming the technical barrier in the practical application of few-layer BPs by enhancing its ambient stability via surface modification.