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Valleytronics leverages the valley degree of freedom to engineer light-matter interaction. Here, the authors demonstrate a room temperature, bias-free valley effect in bulk SnS by means of spectroscopic measurements, previously unattainable using atomically thin transition metal dichalcogenides.

Ultrathin black phosphorus is a two-dimensional semiconductor with a finite band gap, unlike graphene, but it is known to degrade upon exposure to air. Here, the authors show that passivating few-layer samples of this material in an inert gas environment greatly improves the n-type charge transport.

High-quality graphene is grown on copper and then transferred to the underlying substrate, typically silicon oxide or quartz, by simply etching away the copper; the graphene is held in place during etching by capillary bridges.

The alloying of graphene and hexagonal boron nitride results in tunable electronic properties that can be used for solid state devices. Lu et al. identify atomic-scale mechanisms of alloying boron–carbon–nitrogen on ruthenium as a model system, which allow for potentially greater control of properties.

Two-dimensional self-assembled heterostructures of graphene oxide and polyamine macromolecules are used to create membranes with tuneable permeability for water and ions.

Individual grain boundaries are imaged using a scanning plasmon interferometry technique, revealing mechanistic insights on electronic transport and plasmon propagation in graphene.

Raman spectroscopy experiments show that the interaction between electrons and phonons in graphene resembles the Dirac fermion–photon coupling in quantum electrodynamics.

A structure of monolayer and bilayer graphene with a small twist between them shows correlated insulating states that can be tuned by changing the twist angle or applying an electric field.

Magnetoresistance, the change in electrical resistance of a material with its magnetic state, is an important phenomenon utilized in technological applications. Here, the authors report large local and non-local magnetoresistance effects in few-layer graphene/boron–nitride heterostructures at room temperature.

Graphene has a centrosymmetric crystal symmetry, which prohibits second-order effects in transport experiments. Yet, giant second-order nonlinear transports can emerge in graphene moiré superlattices at zero magnetic field, originating from the skew scattering of chiral Bloch electrons in the superlattice and giving rise to both longitudinal and transverse nonlinear conductivities under time-reversal symmetry.

Manipulating spin currents in graphene by the spin–orbit interaction is important for many technological developments. Here, the authors show that the presence of residual metallic adatoms in chemical vapour deposition graphene enhances its spin–orbit coupling by three orders of magnitude.

The scalable synthesis of 2D materials critically relies on finding appropriate vapour-phase metal precursors and careful fine-tuning of growth parameters. Here, the authors instead use solid elemental precursors and a single recipe to demonstrate a general approach for synthesising thin epitaxial layers of 20 different 2D binary compounds, including transition metal sulphides, selenides, tellurides, and nitrides.

Phosphorene is a 2D material exhibiting remarkable mechanical, electronic and optical properties. In this Review, we survey fabrication techniques and discuss theoretical and experimental findings, exploring phosphorene from its fundamental properties to its implementation in devices.

How charges travel through a solid and its subsequent distortion of the surrounding lattice, also known as a polaron, are believed to play important roles in determining photocatalytic activities. Here, along with alteration of W doping and temperature of BiVO₄ films, we reveal a new many-body large-hole polaron in W-doped BiVO₄ films and demonstrate that the strong electronic correlations and screening induced large-hole polaron combined with indirect band gap is the key factor to remarkably boost the high photocatalytic activities of BiVO₄. Our study is also promising for searching other large-hole polaron systems to improve the efficiency of photocatalytic activities.

Using a combination of angle-dependent spectroscopic ellipsometry and angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy as a function of temperature and supported by first-principles calculations, we reveal a new pair of correlated plasmonic excitations at 1.04 and 1.52 eV and a significant Fermi level shift of 0.12 eV, accompanied by spectral weight transfer in the topological insulator, Bismuth Selenide (Bi₂Se₃). Interestingly, such a spectral weight transfer over a broad energy range causes a drastic change in the charge-carrier density whereby the contribution of charge-carriers in the bulk starts to rival those in the surface states and Bi₂Se₃ becomes more uniformly conducting.