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1. Strain-Controlled Superconductivity in Few-Layer NbSe ₂

   https://doi.org/10.1021/acsami.0c08804  

   Chen, Cliff; Das, Protik; Aytan, Ece; Zhou, Weimin; Horowitz, Justin; Satpati, Biswarup; Balandin, Alexander A.; Lake, Roger K.; Wei, Peng (August 2020, ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces)
2. Enhancing superconductivity in SrTiO ₃ films with strain

   https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.aaw0120  

   Ahadi, Kaveh; Galletti, Luca; Li, Yuntian; Salmani-Rezaie, Salva; Wu, Wangzhou; Stemmer, Susanne (April 2019, Science Advances)

   The nature of superconductivity in SrTiO 3 , the first oxide superconductor to be discovered, remains a subject of intense debate several decades after its discovery. SrTiO 3 is also an incipient ferroelectric, and several recent theoretical studies have suggested that the two properties may be linked. To investigate whether such a connection exists, we grew strained, epitaxial SrTiO 3 films, which are known to undergo a ferroelectric transition. We show that, for a range of carrier densities, the superconducting transition temperature is enhanced by up to a factor of two compared to unstrained films grown under the same conditions. Moreover, for these films, superconductivity emerges from a resistive state. We discuss the localization behavior in the context of proximity to ferroelectricity. The results point to new opportunities to enhance superconducting transition temperatures in oxide materials. 

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3. Highly Strain-Tunable Interlayer Excitons in MoS ₂ /WSe ₂ Heterobilayers

   https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.nanolett.1c00724  

   Cho, Chullhee; Wong, Joeson; Taqieddin, Amir; Biswas, Souvik; Aluru, Narayana R.; Nam, SungWoo; Atwater, Harry A. (May 2021, Nano Letters)
4. Strain-Tunable Single Photon Sources in WSe ₂ Monolayers

   https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.nanolett.9b02221  

   Iff, Oliver; Tedeschi, Davide; Martín-Sánchez, Javier; Moczała-Dusanowska, Magdalena; Tongay, Sefaattin; Yumigeta, Kentaro; Taboada-Gutiérrez, Javier; Savaresi, Matteo; Rastelli, Armando; Alonso-González, Pablo; et al (September 2019, Nano Letters)
5. Holey Substrate-Directed Strain Patterning in Bilayer MoS₂

   https://doi.org/10.1021/acsnano.1c08348  

   Zhang, Yichao; Choi, Moon-Ki; Haugstad, Greg; Tadmor, Ellad B.; Flannigan, David J. (November 2021, ACS Nano)

   null (Ed.)

   Key properties of two-dimensional (2D) layered materials are highly strain tunable, arising from bond modulation and associated reconfiguration of the energy bands around the Fermi level. Approaches to locally controlling and patterning strain have included both active and passive elastic deformation via sustained loading and templating with nanostructures. Here, by float-capturing ultrathin flakes of single-crystal 2H-MoS₂ on amorphous holey silicon nitride substrates, we find that highly symmetric, high-fidelity strain patterns are formed. The hexagonally arranged holes and surface topography combine to generate highly conformal flake-substrate coverage creating patterns that match optimal centroidal Voronoi tessellation in 2D Euclidean space. Using TEM imaging and diffraction, as well as AFM topographic mapping, we determine that the substrate-driven 3D geometry of the flakes over the holes consists of symmetric, out-of-plane bowl-like deformation of up to 35 nm, with in-plane, isotropic tensile strains of up to 1.8% (measured with both selected-area diffraction and AFM). Atomistic and image simulations accurately predict spontaneous formation of the strain patterns, with van der Waals forces and substrate topography as the input parameters. These results show that predictable patterns and 3D topography can be spontaneously induced in 2D materials captured on bare, holey substrates. The method also enables electron scattering studies of precisely aligned, substrate-free strained regions in transmission mode. 

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