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Synthesis of wafer-scale uniaxially oriented tellurium films via molecular engineering

Nature Synthesis (2026)Cite this article

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Abstract

Low-dimensional materials are expected to play critical roles in next-generation electronic and optoelectronic devices, yet their controlled synthesis remains challenging. This is particularly true for emerging materials with interesting properties such as tellurium. Here we present a molecular engineering approach to synthesize wafer-scale, uniaxially oriented Te nanowire thin films with excellent controllability and uniformity. We show that molecules with an anchor-rope structure can facilitate the oriented growth of Te nanowires on m-plane sapphire. The resulting Te nanowires are well arranged, with 99.7% of them having a 5° angular spread across a 1.3-inch scale. Te nanowire thin film-based transistors show high-performance p-type characteristics. They demonstrate an average room-temperature mobility of 270 cm2 V−1 s−1, with a maximum value reaching up to 560 cm2 V−1 s−1, and on/off ratios as high as 104. Our work lays the foundations for the application of low-dimensional tellurium, and the substrate molecule-engineering strategy may offer insights into the controlled synthesis of other low-dimensional functional materials.

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Fig. 1: Wafer-scale uniaxially oriented TeNW-TFs.
Fig. 2: Atomic microstructure of the uniaxially oriented tellurium nanowires.
Fig. 3: Growth mechanism of the uniaxially oriented TeNW-TF.
Fig. 4: Electrical characterizations of FET devices fabricated on uniaxially oriented TeNW-TFs.

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The authors declare that data supporting the findings of this study are available within the article and its Supplementary Information. Source data are provided with this paper.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (grant nos. U24A2055 to Z.W., 12204122 to S.L., U24A20302 to F.W., 62374048 to Z.W., 62274046 to F.W., 12134019 to Z.H. and 21773124 to Z.H.) and the National Key R&D Program of China (grant no. 2021YFA1201500 to Z.W.). We also gratefully acknowledge the support of the Youth Innovation Promotion Association CAS to F.W. and CAS Key Laboratory of Nanosystem and Hierarchical Fabrication.

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: Shuhui Li, Haoyu Wei, Yutong Xiong.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. National Center for Nanoscience and Technology, Beijing, People’s Republic of China

    Shuhui Li, Yutong Xiong, Zhenxing Wang, Feng Wang, Pengyu Zhang, Yuchen Cai, Yuhan Zhu, Xueying Zhan & Qingdao Zeng

  2. Center of Materials Science and Optoelectronics Engineering, University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, People’s Republic of China

    Shuhui Li, Zhenxing Wang, Feng Wang, Pengyu Zhang, Yuchen Cai, Yuhan Zhu & Xueying Zhan

  3. School of Physics, Frontiers Science Center for New Organic Matter, Nankai University, Tianjin, People’s Republic of China

    Haoyu Wei & Zhenpeng Hu

  4. Key Laboratory of Artificial Micro- and Nano-Structures of the Ministry of Education, School of Physics and Technology, Wuhan University, Wuhan, People’s Republic of China

    Jun He

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Contributions

Z.W. and S.L. conceived the idea. S.L. performed all the experiments. F.W. supervised the device fabrication. Z.H. and H.W. conducted the calculations. Y.X. and Q.Z. carried out the scanning tunnelling microscopy measurements. S.L., F.W. and H.W. wrote the paper. Z.W., F.W. and Z.H. revised the paper. Z.W. supervised the project. J.H. provided the funding support. P.Z., Y.C., Y.Z. and X.Z. provided help with the experiments. All authors contributed to data analysis and discussions.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Zhenxing Wang, Feng Wang, Qingdao Zeng, Zhenpeng Hu or Jun He.

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Competing interests

A provisional patent has been filed on the utilization of molecular engineering substrate in growing wafer-scale uniaxially oriented nanowire films in China (application no. 202511579506.7; Z.W., S.L., F.W., X.Z., Y.C. and P.Z., National Center for Nanoscience and Technology).

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Nature Synthesis thanks Marco Gobbi, Hua Xu and the other, anonymous, reviewer(s) for their contribution to the peer review of this work. Primary Handling Editor: Alexandra Groves, in collaboration with the Nature Synthesis team.

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Li, S., Wei, H., Xiong, Y. et al. Synthesis of wafer-scale uniaxially oriented tellurium films via molecular engineering. Nat. Synth (2026). https://doi.org/10.1038/s44160-025-00958-6

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