Did You Know That TMDs Are Also Capable Of Acting As Transistors?

The interest on graphene usage in transistors has been widespread all over the world. The concept is being discussed all over and is attracting researchers from all over the world. But the biggest challenge by most of these scientists was the lack of band gap. This compelled the researchers to look for some other substance that could meet the requirement. A duo of physicists from the Dallas located University of Texas recently found that properties of a few substances that can be used for the next-generation electronics and transistors.

One of the most interesting aspects of the transition metal dichalcogenides is that these can be transformed into sheets that are just a few molecules thick. Dr. Fan Zhang says, “It was thought that graphene could be used in transistors, but in transistors, you need to be able to switch the electric current on and off. With graphene, however, the current cannot be easily switched off. TMDs have an energy gap that allows the flow of electrons to be controlled,” said researcher Armin Khamoshi said. “This gap makes TMDs ideal for use in transistors. TMDs are also very good absorbers of circularly polarized light, so they could be used in detectors.”

TMDs act as transistors

Khamoshi and Dr Zhang, explained through their latest project offered a theoretical guidance to a group that was working at the Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. These people were working on layer-by-layer construction of TMD device along with usage of magnetic materials that helps in study of electrons journey through an instrument. Every single TMD layer is around three molecules thick along with the layers that are sandwiched between the boron nitride sheets. Dr Zhang, further adds, “This is a very surprising finding. It doesn’t matter how many layers you have; rather, it’s whether there are an odd or even number of layers.”

Over a quantum scale, the electrical transverse conductance of 2D materials changes in discrete manner when subjected to magnetic field. Dr Zhang likes to call it quantum Hall conductance and further adds, “Quantum Hall conductance might change one step by one step, or two steps by two steps, and so on. We found that if we used an even number of TMD layers, there was a 12 step quantum conductance. If we applied a strong enough magnetic field, it would change by six steps at a time.”