Gas Sensing with h-BN Capped MoS2 Heterostructure Thin Film Transistors

We have demonstrated selective gas sensing with molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) thin films transistors capped with a thin layer of hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN). The resistance change was used as a sensing parameter to detect chemical vapors such as ethanol, acetonitrile, toluene, chloroform and methanol. It was found that h-BN dielectric passivation layer does not prevent gas detection via changes in the source-drain current in the active MoS2 thin film channel. The use of h-BN cap layers (thickness H=10 nm) in the design of MoS2 thin film gas sensors improves device stability and prevents device degradation due to environmental and chemical exposure. The obtained results are important for applications of van der Waals materials in chemical and biological sensing.Comment: 3 pages; 4 figure

Electrical and Noise Characteristics of Graphene Field-Effect Transistors: Ambient Effects and Noise Sources

We fabricated a large number of single and bilayer graphene transistors and carried out a systematic experimental study of their low-frequency noise characteristics. A special attention was given to determining the dominant noise sources in these devices and the effect of aging on the current-voltage and noise characteristics. The analysis of the noise spectral density dependence on the area of graphene channel showed that the dominant contributions to the low-frequency electronic noise come from the graphene layer itself rather than from the contacts. Aging of graphene transistors due to exposure to ambient for over a month resulted in substantially increased noise attributed to the decreasing mobility of graphene and increasing contact resistance. The noise spectral density in both single and bilayer graphene transistors either increased with deviation from the charge neutrality point or depended weakly on the gate bias. This observation confirms that the low-frequency noise characteristics of graphene transistors are qualitatively different from those of conventional silicon metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistors.Comment: 26 pages with 8 figure

Anomalous Electron Transport in Field-Effect Transistors with Titanium Ditelluride Semimetal Thin-Film Channels

We report on "graphene-like" mechanical exfoliation of thin films of titanium ditelluride and investigation of their electronic properties. The exfoliated crystalline TiTe2 films were used as the channel layers in the back-gated field-effect transistors fabricated with Ti/Al/Au metal contacts on SiO2/Si substrates. The room-temperature current-voltage characteristics revealed strongly non-linear behavior with signatures of the source-drain threshold voltage similar to those observed in the charge-density-wave devices. The drain-current showed an unusual non-monotonic dependence on the gate bias characterized by the presence of multiple peaks. The obtained results can be potentially used for implementation of the non-Boolean logic gates.Comment: 11 pages, 4 figure

Towards More Accurate Molecular Dynamics Calculation of Thermal Conductivity. Case Study: GaN Bulk Crystals

Significant differences exist among literature for thermal conductivity of various systems computed using molecular dynamics simulation. In some cases, unphysical results, for example, negative thermal conductivity, have been found. Using GaN as an example case and the direct non-equilibrium method, extensive molecular dynamics simulations and Monte Carlo analysis of the results have been carried out to quantify the uncertainty level of the molecular dynamics methods and to identify the conditions that can yield sufficiently accurate calculations of thermal conductivity. We found that the errors of the calculations are mainly due to the statistical thermal fluctuations. Extrapolating results to the limit of an infinite-size system tend to magnify the errors and occasionally lead to unphysical results. The error in bulk estimates can be reduced by performing longer time averages using properly selected systems over a range of sample lengths. If the errors in the conductivity estimates associated with each of the sample lengths are kept below a certain threshold, the likelihood of obtaining unphysical bulk values becomes insignificant. Using a Monte-Carlo approach developed here, we have determined the probability distributions for the bulk thermal conductivities obtained using the direct method. We also have observed a nonlinear effect that can become a source of significant errors. For the extremely accurate results presented here, we predict a [0001] GaN thermal conductivity of 185 $\rm{W/K \cdot m}$ at 300 K, 102 $\rm{W/K \cdot m}$ at 500 K, and 74 $\rm{W/K \cdot m}$ at 800 K. Using the insights obtained in the work, we have achieved a corresponding error level (standard deviation) for the bulk (infinite sample length) GaN thermal conductivity of less than 10 $\rm{W/K \cdot m}$, 5 $\rm{W/K \cdot m}$, and 15 $\rm{W/K \cdot m}$ at 300 K, 500 K, and 800 K respectively

Low-Frequency 1/f Noise in MoS2 Thin-Film Transistors: Comparison of Single and Multilayer Structures

We report on the transport and low-frequency noise measurements of MoS2 thin-film transistors with "thin" (2-3 atomic layers) and "thick" (15-18 atomic layers) channels. The back-gated transistors made with the relatively thick MoS2 channels have advantages of the higher electron mobility and lower noise level. The normalized noise spectral density of the low-frequency 1/f noise in "thick" MoS2 transistors is of the same level as that in graphene. The MoS2 transistors with the atomically thin channels have substantially higher noise levels. It was established that, unlike in graphene devices, the noise characteristics of MoS2 transistors with "thick" channels (15-18 atomic planes) could be described by the McWhorter model. Our results indicate that the channel thickness optimization is crucial for practical applications of MoS2 thin-film transistors.Comment: 12 pages, 3 figure