Symposium NM03-Engineering Ultra-Thin Chalcogenide Films

Layered chalcogenide-based materials have been shown to possess highly sought-after properties such as non-trivial topologies in metals and insulators, superconductivity, semiconductors with high carrier mobilities, piezo- and ferro-electricity, as well as a high performance in opto- and photo-electronics. As much as interest in those materials in the form of ultra-thin films has gained momentum for future high-performing applications, so have efforts of their fabrication and characterization. However, their layered van der Waals nature poses an obstacle for the bottom-up synthesis of large-scale thin film growth of precise thickness. Layer-by-layer growth – a prerequisite to achieve even film coverage with a defined number of layers, is suppressed by the ultra-low surface energy of the van der Waals planes. High-angle rotational domain formation is prevalent due to the weak substrate-film and interlayer interactions across the van der Waals gap. Probing film properties thoroughly in the ultra-thin to single layer limit is time-consuming and expensive. Furthermore, in the ultra-thin limit, defects and impurities stemming from the synthesis process may mask the intrinsic properties of the materials. Achievements in synthesis that translate into progress for device applications are tied to studies of thin film growth kinetics and the properties of ultra-thin films to further our understanding of the early stages of growth. This symposium will bring together a diverse set of researchers – from academia to national labs and fundamental physics and materials science to synthesis and devices – who are at the forefront of advancing the understanding of layered chalcogenide-based materials thin film growth and their potential. We aim to cover the wide range of bottom-up synthesis of layered chalcogenide-based materials chemistries such as mono-, di-, tri-, transition metal-, sesqui-, group-III-, and group-IV-chalcogenides in thin film form, their characterization and potential for applications.

Topics will include:

Engineering of chalcogenide-based layered thin films and heterostructures – doping, alloying or defect control
Characterization of thin and ultra-thin films
Structure-property correlation-electronic, optical, and magnetic properties of layered chalcogenides
Theory and simulation of chalcogenide thin film growth processes and properties for predictive engineering
Applications of layered chalcogenide thin films
Solar Cells
Photocatalysis

Invited Speakers:

Zakaria Al Balushi (University of California, Berkeley, USA)
Nicholas Borys (Montana State University, USA)
Kenneth Burch (Boston College, USA)
Yufeng Hao (Nanjing University, China)
Danielle Hickey (The Pennsylvania State University, USA)
Rafael Jaramillo (Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA)
Deep Jariwala (University of Pennsylvania, USA)
Kibum Kang (Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Republic of Korea)
Yu Lei (Tsinghua University, China)
Saurabh Lodha (Indian Institute of Technology Bombay, India)
Marcelo Lopes (Paul Drude Institute for Solid State Electronics, Germany)
Nadire Nayir (Istanbul Technical University, Turkey)
Tianchao Niu (Institute of International Innovation Beihang University, China)
Seongshik Oh (Rutgers University, USA)
Frank Peiris (Kenyon College, USA)
Michael Pettes (Los Alamos National Laboratory, USA)
Lin Wang (Shanghai Jiao Tong University, China)
Yuanxi Wang (University of North Texas, USA)