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Electrical control of the valley Hall effect in bilayer MoS2 transistors

Nature Nanotechnology volume 11, pages 421–425 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

The valley degree of freedom of electrons in solids has been proposed as a new type of information carrier, beyond the electron charge and spin1,2,3,4,5,6. The potential of two-dimensional semiconductor transition metal dichalcogenides in valley-based electronic and optoelectronic applications has recently been illustrated through experimental demonstrations of the optical orientation of the valley polarization7,8,9,10 and of the valley Hall effect11 in monolayer MoS2. However, the valley Hall conductivity in monolayer MoS2, a non-centrosymmetric crystal, cannot be easily tuned, which presents a challenge for the development of valley-based applications. Here, we show that the valley Hall effect in bilayer MoS2 transistors can be controlled with a gate voltage. The gate applies an electric field perpendicular to the plane of the material, breaking the inversion symmetry present in bilayer MoS2. The valley polarization induced by the longitudinal electrical current was imaged with Kerr rotation microscopy. The polarization was found to be present only near the edges of the device channel with opposite sign for the two edges, and was out-of-plane and strongly dependent on the gate voltage. Our observations are consistent with symmetry-dependent Berry curvature and valley Hall conductivity in bilayer MoS212.

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Figure 1: MoS2 structure and device characterization.
Figure 2: VHE in bilayer MoS2 (device 1).
Figure 3: Gate dependence of the VHE (device 1).
Figure 4: Gate dependence of the VHE and SHG (device 2).

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Basic Energy Sciences under contract No. DESC0013883 (K.F.M.) and the Air Force Office of Scientific Research under grant FA9550-14-1-0268 (J.S.). Kerr rotation microscopy was supported by the National Science Foundation under Award No. DMR-1410407 and 1420451.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics and Center for 2-Dimensional and Layered Materials, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, 16802-6300, Pennsylvania, USA

    Jieun Lee, Kin Fai Mak & Jie Shan

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  1. Jieun Lee
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  2. Kin Fai Mak
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  3. Jie Shan
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Contributions

All authors conceived and designed the experiments, analyzed the data, and co-wrote the manuscript. J.L. fabricated the MoS2 FET devices and performed the measurements.

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Correspondence to Kin Fai Mak or Jie Shan.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Lee, J., Mak, K. & Shan, J. Electrical control of the valley Hall effect in bilayer MoS2 transistors. Nature Nanotech 11, 421–425 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2015.337

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