Control of Radiation Damage in MoS2 by Graphene Encapsulation

Abstract

Recent dramatic progress in studying various two-dimensional (2D) atomic crystals and their heterostructures calls for better and more detailed understanding of their crystallography, reconstruction, stacking order, etc. For this, direct imaging and identification of each and every atom is essential. Transmission Electron Microscopy (TEM) and Scanning Transmission Electron Microscopy (STEM) are ideal, and perhaps the only tools for such studies. However, the electron beam can in some cases induce dramatic structure changes and radiation damage becomes an obstacle in obtaining the desired information in imaging and chemical analysis in the (S)TEM. This is the case of 2D materials such as molybdenum disulfide MoS2, but also of many biological specimens, molecules and proteins. Thus, minimizing damage to the specimen is essential for optimum microscopic analysis. In this letter we demonstrate, on the example of MoS2, that encapsulation of such crystals between two layers of graphene allows for a dramatic improvement in stability of the studied 2D crystal, and permits careful control over the defect nature and formation in it. We present STEM data collected from single layer MoS2 samples prepared for observation in the microscope through three distinct procedures. The fabricated single layer MoS2 samples were either left bare (pristine), placed atop a single-layer of graphene or finally encapsulated between single graphene layers. Their behaviour under the electron beam is carefully compared and we show that the MoS2 sample 'sandwiched' between the graphene layers has the highest durability and lowest defect formation rate compared to the other two samples, for very similar experimental conditions.

This document is the Submitted Manuscript version of a Published Work that appeared in final form in ACS Nano,copyright \c{opyright}[2013] http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/nn4044035

References in corpus (7)

• Two Dimensional Atomic Crystals
• Two-dimensional transition metal dichalcogenides under electron irradiation: defect production and doping
• Imaging and Dynamics of Light Atoms and Molecules on Graphene
• Magnetism in MoS2 induced by MeV proton irradiation
• The pristine atomic structure of MoS2 monolayer protected from electron radiation damage by graphene
• Graphene as a transparent conductive support for studying biological molecules by transmission electron microscopy
• Direct Experimental Evidence of Metal-Mediated Etching of Suspended Graphene

Cited by in corpus (38)

• Square ice in graphene nanocapillaries
• Graphene Versus MoS2: a Short Review
• Mechanical Properties of MoS2/Graphene Heterostructures
• The pristine atomic structure of MoS2 monolayer protected from electron radiation damage by graphene
• Quantifying transmission electron microscopy irradiation effects using two-dimensional materials
• Assembling Di- and Multiatomic Si Clusters in Graphene via Electron Beam Manipulation
• A Gaussian Treatment for the Friction Issue of Lennard-Jones Potential in Layered Materials: Application to Friction between Graphene, MoS2 and Black Phosphorus
• Strain Engineering 2D MoS${}_2$ with Thin Film Stress Capping Layers
• Atomic structure of intrinsic and electron-irradiation-induced defects in MoTe2
• Buckyball sandwiches
• Intense femtosecond photoexcitation of bulk and monolayer MoS2
• Non-invasive transmission electron microscopy of vacancy defects in graphene produced by ion irradiation
• Towards Exotic Layered Materials: 2D Cuprous Iodide
• Perforating freestanding molybdenum disulfide monolayers with highly charged ions
• Rippling, buckling and melting of single- and multi-layer MoS${}_2$
• Contact resistance and interfacial engineering: Advances in high-performance 2D-TMD based devices
• Creation of single vacancies in hBN with electron irradiation
• Fabrication and Imaging of Monolayer Phosphorene with Preferred Edge Configurations via Graphene-Assisted Layer-by-Layer Thinning
• Interlayer Charge Transfer and Defect Creation in Type I van der Waals Heterostructures
• Direct Visualization of Electric Field induced Structural Dynamics in Monolayer Transition Metal Dichalcogenides
• Dynamics of Symmetry-Breaking Stacking Boundaries in Bilayer MoS2
• Convergent beam electron holography for analysis of van der Waals heterostructures
• Direct imaging of liquid-nanoparticle interface with atom probe tomography
• Pinpointing the Dominant Component of Contact Resistance to Atomically Thin Semiconductors
• Superconductivity in freestanding infinite-layer nickelate membranes
• Atomic Resolution Imaging of CrBr${}_3$ using Adhesion-Enhanced Grids
• Direct Optical-Structure Correlation in Atomically Thin Dichalcogenides and Heterostructures
• Experimental detection of active defects in few layers MoS2 through random telegraphic signals analysis observed in its FET characteristics
• Top-down fabrication of atomic patterns in twisted bilayer graphene
• Convergent beam electron diffraction of multilayer van der Waals structures
• Bilayer graphene as a template for manufacturing novel 2D materials
• Three-dimensional description of vibration-assisted electron knock-on damage
• Effect of electron-irradiation on layered quantum materials
• Deep-learning interatomic potential for irradiation damage simulations in MoS2 with ab initial accuracy
• Image Difference Metrics for High-Resolution Electron Microscopy
• Realization of 2D Crystalline Metal Nitrides via Selective Atomic Substitution
• A Se vacancy induced localized Raman mode in two-dimensional MoSe2 grown by CVD
• Hexatic Phase in Covalent Two-Dimensional Silver Iodide