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Abstract Ultrathin 2D metal oxides are a high‐performance class of transparent conducting materials capable of overcoming the traditional limitations of inorganic flexible electronics. The low temperature, thermodynamically favorable synthesis of 2D oxides at liquid metal interfaces offers the potential for printing these materials over large areas at unprecedented speeds with sub‐nanometer scale precision. However, these native oxides are sub‐stoichiometric and highly conductive, so new strategies are needed that can precisely engineer the electrostatics and enhance stability. In this work, the crystalline vs. amorphous phase of 2D oxides is engineered via alloying of ternary In1‐ySnyOxand ultralow deposition temperatures (120–160 °C) are afforded by In‐Sn eutectics. This approach is extended to rapid assembly of nanoscale (3–5 nm per layer) vertical 2D homojunctions with electrostatically favorable grading from high density of states front channels to lower density of states back‐channels. Detailed materials characterization reveals how this platform enhances electron mobility while improving resilience under bias‐stress in metal oxide transistors. Devices based on amorphous 2D oxide homojunctions with high‐k sol‐gel ZrOxdielectrics achieve excellent electron mobility (30 cm2/V·s), steep switching (SS of 100 mV dec−1), Ion/offof 107and 10X reduced bias‐stress shifts, presenting an ideal strategy for high‐performance flexible oxide electronics.
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Role of morphology in defect formation and photo-induced carrier instabilities in amorphous indium oxide
Ab initio molecular dynamics liquid-quench simulations and hybrid density functional calculations are performed to model the effects of room-temperature atomic fluctuations and photo-illumination on the structural and electronic properties of amorphous sub-stoichiometric In 2 O 2.96 . A large configurational ensemble is employed to reliably predict the distribution of localized defects as well as their response to the thermal and light activation. The results reveal that the illumination effects on the carrier concentration are greater in amorphous configurations with shorter In–O bond length and reduced polyhedral sharing as compared to the structures with a more uniform morphology. The obtained correlation between the photo-induced carrier density and the reduction in the number of fully coordinated In-atoms implies that metal oxides with a significant fraction of crystalline/amorphous interfaces would show a more pronounced response to illumination. Photo-excitation also produces In–O 2 –In defects that have not been previously found in sub-stoichiometric amorphous oxides; these defects are responsible for carrier instabilities due to overdoping.
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- PAR ID:
- 10402366
- Date Published:
- Journal Name:
- Applied Physics Letters
- Volume:
- 121
- Issue:
- 26
- ISSN:
- 0003-6951
- Page Range / eLocation ID:
- 261902
- Format(s):
- Medium: X
- Sponsoring Org:
- National Science Foundation
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- Free Publicly Accessible Full Text
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Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Article:
- https://doi.org/10.1063/5.0128941
