Room-temperature ductile inorganic semiconductor

Nature Materials volume 17, pages421–426(2018)Cite this article

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Abstract

Ductility is common in metals and metal-based alloys, but is rarely observed in inorganic semiconductors and ceramic insulators. In particular, room-temperature ductile inorganic semiconductors were not known until now. Here, we report an inorganic α-Ag2S semiconductor that exhibits extraordinary metal-like ductility with high plastic deformation strains at room temperature. Analysis of the chemical bonding reveals systems of planes with relatively weak atomic interactions in the crystal structure. In combination with irregularly distributed silver–silver and sulfur–silver bonds due to the silver diffusion, they suppress the cleavage of the material, and thus result in unprecedented ductility. This work opens up the possibility of searching for ductile inorganic semiconductors/ceramics for flexible electronic devices.

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Fig. 1: Inorganic semiconductor α-Ag2S and its mechanical properties.
Fig. 2: Room-temperature mechanical properties of the semiconductor α-Ag2S.
Fig. 3: Ductility of α-Ag2S.
Fig. 4: Bonding features and slipping in α-Ag2S.

Change history

  • 30 May 2018

    In the version of this Article originally published, the x-axis numbers of Fig. 3d were incorrect; the range should have been 0 to 12 instead of 1 to 13. This has now been corrected.

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Acknowledgements

We thank K.Lu at the Institute of Metal Research for helpful discussions. This work is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) under grant numbers 51625205 and 51632010, the Key Research Program of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (grant number KFZD-SW-421) and the Shanghai Government (grant number 15JC1400301 and 16XD1403900).

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Affiliations

  1. State Key Laboratory of High Performance Ceramics and Superfine Microstructure, Shanghai Institute of Ceramics, Chinese Academy of Science, Shanghai, China
    • Xun Shi
    • , Hongyi Chen
    • , Feng Hao
    • , Ruiheng Liu
    • , Tuo Wang
    • , Pengfei Qiu
    •  & Lidong Chen
  2. Shanghai Tech University, Shanghai, China
    • Hongyi Chen
  3. University of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing, China
    • Feng Hao
    •  & Tuo Wang
  4. Max-Planck-Institut für Chemische Physik fester Stoffe, Dresden, Germany
    • Ulrich Burkhardt
    •  & Yuri Grin
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Contributions

F.H., R.L., T.W. and X.S. prepared the samples and measured the physical properties. H.C. performed ab initio calculations. U.B. performed microstructure experiments. Y.G. performed evaluation of X-ray diffraction measurements, structure refinements and quantum chemical calculations. X.S., H.C., R.L., Y.G. P.Q and L.C. wrote and edited the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Xun Shi or Yuri Grin or Lidong Chen.

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Supplementary Information

Supplementary Tables: S1–S2, Supplementary Figures: Figures S1–S13

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Shi, X., Chen, H., Hao, F. et al. Room-temperature ductile inorganic semiconductor. Nature Mater 17, 421–426 (2018). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-018-0047-z

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