Ultrathin bismuth exhibits promising performance for topological insulators due to its narrow band gap and intrinsic strong spin-orbit coupling, as well as for energy-related applications because of its electronic and mechanical properties. However, large-scale production of 2D sheets via liquid-phase exfoliation as an established large-scale method is restricted by the strong interaction between bismuth layers. Here, a sonication method is utilized to produce ultrahigh-aspect-ratio bismuthene microsheets. The studies on the mechanism excludes the exfoliation of the layered bulk bismuth and formation of the microsheets is attributed to the melting of spherical particles (r = 1.5 µm) at a high temperature-generated under the ultrasonic tip-followed by a recrystallization step producing uniformly-shaped ultrathin microsheets (A = 0.5-2 µm2 , t: ≈2 nm). Notably, although the preparation is performed in oxygenated aqueous solution, the sheets are not oxidized, and they are stable under ambient conditions for at least 1 month. The microsheets are used to construct a vapor sensor using electrochemical impedance spectroscopy as detection technique. The device is highly selective, and it shows long-term stability. Overall, this project exhibits a reproducible method for large-scale preparation of ultrathin bismuthene microsheets in a benign environment, demonstrating opportunities to realize devices based on bismuthene.

Center for the Advanced Functional Nanorobots Department of Inorganic Chemistry University of Chemistry and Technology Technická 5 Prague Czech Republic

Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering Yonsei University 50 Yonsei ro Seodaemun gu Seoul 03722 Korea

Department of Medical Research China Medical University Hospital China Medical University No 91 Hsueh Shih Road Taichung Taiwan

Future Energy and Innovation Laboratory Central European Institute of Technology Brno University of Technology Purkyňova 656 123 Brno CZ 616 00 Czech Republic

See more in PubMed

a) O. Prakash, A. Kumar, A. Thamizhavel, S. Ramakrishnan, Science 2017, 355, 52;

b) V. S. Édel'man, Adv. Phys. 1976, 25, 555;

c) A. V. Ettingshausen, W. Nernst, Ann. Phys. Chem. 1886, 265, 343;

d) Y. Fuseya, M. Ogata, H. Fukuyama, J. Phys. Soc. Jpn. 2015, 84, 012001.

L. A. Fal'kovskiĭ, Phys. Usp. 1968, 11, 1.

a) L. Li, J. G. Checkelsky, Y. S. Hor, C. Uher, A. F. Hebard, R. J. Cava, N. P. Ong, Science 2008, 321, 547.

b) E. Aktürk, O. Üzengi Aktürk, S. Ciraci, Phys. Rev. B 2016, 94, 014115.

a) P. Hofmann, Prog. Surf. Sci. 2006, 81, 191;

b) Y. Guo, Y.-F. Zhang, X.-Y. Bao, T.-Z. Han, Z. Tang, L.-X. Zhang, W.-G. Zhu, E. G. Wang, Q. Niu, Z. Q. Qiu, J.-F. Jia, Z.-X. Zhao, Q.-K. Xue, Science 2004, 306, 1915;

c) J. W. Wells, K. Handrup, J. F. Kallehauge, L. Gammelgaard, P. Bøggild, M. B. Balslev, J. E. Hansen, P. R. E. Petersen, P. Hofmann, J. Appl. Phys. 2008, 104, 053717.

a) M. Tian, J. Wang, N. Kumar, T. Han, Y. Kobayashi, Y. Liu, T. E. Mallouk, M. H. W. Chan, Nano Lett. 2006, 6, 2773;

b) T. Hamada, K. Yamakawa, F. E. Fujita, J. Phys. F: Metal Phys. 1981, 11, 657;

c) M. Tian, J. Wang, Q. Zhang, N. Kumar, T. E. Mallouk, M. H. W. Chan, Nano Lett. 2009, 9, 3196;

d) P. J. Hakonen, G. Nunes, J. Phys.: Condens. Mat. 1991, 3, 7153.

L. Cheng, H. Liu, X. Tan, J. Zhang, J. Wei, H. Lv, J. Shi, X. Tang, J. Phys. Chem. C 2014, 118, 904.

a) J. Huang, X. Lin, H. Tan, B. Zhang, Adv. Energy Mater. 2018, 8, 1703496;

b) D. Su, S. Dou, G. Wang, Nano Energy 2015, 12, 88;

c) Y. Zhao, A. Manthiram, Chem. Mater. 2015, 27, 3096;

d) H. Gao, J. Niu, C. Zhang, Z. Peng, Z. Zhang, ACS Nano 2018, 12, 3568;

e) P. Xiong, P. Bai, A. Li, B. Li, M. Cheng, Y. Chen, S. Huang, Q. Jiang, X.-H. Bu, Y. Xu, Adv. Mater. 2019, 31, 1904771.

F. Xu, B. Ge, J. Chen, A. Nathan, L. L. Xin, H. Ma, H. Min, C. Zhu, W. Xia, Z. Li, S. Li, K. Yu, L. Wu, Y. Cui, L. Sun, Y. Zhu, 2D Mater. 2016, 3, 025005.

a) J. Sun, H.-W. Lee, M. Pasta, H. Yuan, G. Zheng, Y. Sun, Y. Li, Y. Cui, Nat. Nanotechnol. 2015, 10, 980;

b) S. M. Beladi-Mousavi, M. Pumera, Chem. Soc. Rev. 2018, 47, 6964.

a) Y.-C. Hao, Y. Guo, L.-W. Chen, M. Shu, X.-Y. Wang, T.-A. Bu, W.-Y. Gao, N. Zhang, X. Su, X. Feng, J.-W. Zhou, B. Wang, C.-W. Hu, A.-X. Yin, R. Si, Y.-W. Zhang, C.-H. Yan, Nat. Catal. 2019, 2, 448;

b) Y. Wang, M.-m. Shi, D. Bao, F.-l. Meng, Q. Zhang, Y.-t. Zhou, K.-h. Liu, Y. Zhang, J.-z. Wang, Z.-w. Chen, D.-p. Liu, Z. Jiang, M. Luo, L. Gu, Q.-h. Zhang, X.-z. Cao, Y. Yao, M.-h. Shao, Y. Zhang, X.-B. Zhang, J. G. Chen, J.-m. Yan, Q. Jiang, Angew. Chem., Int. Ed. 2019, 58, 9464;

c) F. Wang, X. Lv, X. Zhu, J. Du, S. Lu, A. A. Alshehri, K. A. Alzahrani, B. Zheng, X. Sun, Chem. Commun. 2020, 56, 2107.

a) K. Fan, Y. Jia, Y. Ji, P. Kuang, B. Zhu, X. Liu, J. Yu, ACS Catal. 2020, 10, 358;

b) N. Han, Y. Wang, H. Yang, J. Deng, J. Wu, Y. Li, Y. Li, Nat. Commun. 2018, 9, 1320.

a) J. R. Schaibley, H. Yu, G. Clark, P. Rivera, J. S. Ross, K. L. Seyler, W. Yao, X. Xu, Nat. Rev. Mater. 2016, 1, 16055;

b) Z. Sun, A. Martinez, F. Wang, Nat. Photonics 2016, 10, 227;

c) S. M. Beladi-Mousavi, B. Khezri, L. Krejčová, Z. Heger, Z. Sofer, A. C. Fisher, M. Pumera, ACS Appl. Mater. Interfaces 2019, 11, 13359;

d) B. Khezri, S. M. Beladi Mousavi, Z. Sofer, M. Pumera, Nanoscale 2019, 11, 8825;

e) S. M. Beladi-Mousavi, B. Khezri, S. Matějková, Z. Sofer, M. Pumera, Angew. Chem. 2019, 131, 13474.

f) B. Guo, S.-H. Wang, Z.-X. Wu, Z.-X. Wang, D.-H. Wang, H. Huang, F. Zhang, Y.-Q. Ge, H. Zhang, Opt. Express 2018, 26, 22750;

g) C. Xing, W. Huang, Z. Xie, J. Zhao, D. Ma, T. Fan, W. Liang, Y. Ge, B. Dong, J. Li, H. Zhang, ACS Photonics 2018, 5, 621;

h) X. Ren, J. Zhou, X. Qi, Y. Liu, Z. Huang, Z. Li, Y. Ge, S. C. Dhanabalan, J. S. Ponraj, S. Wang, J. Zhong, H. Zhang, Adv. Energy Mater. 2017, 7, 1700396;

i) Y. Zhou, M. Zhang, Z. Guo, L. Miao, S.-T. Han, Z. Wang, X. Zhang, H. Zhang, Z. Peng, Mater. Horiz. 2017, 4, 997.

S. M. Beladi-Mousavi, A. M. Pourrahimi, Z. Sofer, M. Pumera, Adv. Funct. Mater. 2019, 29, 1807004.

a) L. Lu, Z. Liang, L. Wu, Y. Chen, Y. Song, S. C. Dhanabalan, J. S. Ponraj, B. Dong, Y. Xiang, F. Xing, D. Fan, H. Zhang, Laser Photonics Rev. 2018, 12, 1700221;

b) Y. Huang, C. Zhu, S. Zhang, X. Hu, K. Zhang, W. Zhou, S. Guo, F. Xu, H. Zeng, Nano Lett. 2019, 19, 1118;

c) K. Yamada, S. Souma, K. Yamauchi, N. Shimamura, K. Sugawara, C. X. Trang, T. Oguchi, K. Ueno, T. Takahashi, T. Sato, Nano Lett. 2018, 18, 3235;

d) Y. Hu, Z.-H. Qi, J. Lu, R. Chen, M. Zou, T. C. W. Zhang, Y. Wang, X. Xue, J. Ma, Z. Jin, Chem. Mater. 2019, 31, 4524;

e) Z.-H. Qi, Y. Hu, Z. Jin, J. Ma, Phys. Chem. Chem. Phys. 2019, 21, 12087;

f) X. Wang, Y. Hu, J. Mo, J. Zhang, Z. Wang, W. Wei, H. Li, Y. Xu, J. Ma, J. Zhao, Z. Jin, Z. Guo, Angew. Chem., Int. Ed. 2020, 59, 5151.

X. Liu, S. Zhang, S. Guo, B. Cai, S. A. Yang, F. Shan, M. Pumera, H. Zeng, Chem. Soc. Rev. 2020, 49, 263.

E. Aktürk, O. Ü. Aktürk, S. Ciraci, Phys. Rev. B 2016, 94, 014115.

a) Q.-Q. Yang, R.-T. Liu, C. Huang, Y.-F. Huang, L.-F. Gao, B. Sun, Z.-P. Huang, L. Zhang, C.-X. Hu, Z.-Q. Zhang, C.-L. Sun, Q. Wang, Y.-L. Tang, H.-L. Zhang, Nanoscale 2018, 10, 21106;

b) W. Zhang, Y. Hu, L. Ma, G. Zhu, P. Zhao, X. Xue, R. Chen, S. Yang, J. Ma, J. Liu, Z. Jin, Nano Energy 2018, 53, 808;

c) R. Gusmão, Z. Sofer, D. Bouša, M. Pumera, Angew. Chem., Int. Ed. 2017, 56, 14417.

M. Pumera, Z. Sofer, Adv. Mater. 2017, 29, 1605299.

F. Song, X. Hu, Nat. Commun. 2014, 5, 4477.

a) E. S. Walker, S. R. Na, D. Jung, S. D. March, J.-S. Kim, T. Trivedi, W. Li, L. Tao, M. L. Lee, K. M. Liechti, D. Akinwande, S. R. Bank, Nano Lett. 2016, 16, 6931;

b) K. Trentelman, J. Raman Spectrosc. 2009, 40, 585;

c) A. J. Salazar-Pérez, M. A. Camacho-López, R. A. Morales-Luckie, V. Sánchez-Mendieta, F. Ureña-Ñúñez, J. Arenas-Alatorre, Superficies Vacío 2005, 18, 4.

a) A. R. Patel, G. K. Shivakumar, Thin Solid Films 1976, 33, 13;

b) M. Kammler, M. Horn-von Hoegen, Surf. Sci. 2005, 576, 56;

c) S. Yaginuma, T. Nagao, J. T. Sadowski, M. Saito, K. Nagaoka, Y. Fujikawa, T. Sakurai, T. Nakayama, Surf. Sci. 2007, 601, 3593;

d) J. Li, J. Chen, H. Wang, N. Chen, Z. Wang, L. Guo, F. L. Deepak, Adv. Sci. 2018, 5, 1700992;

e) T. Nagao, J. T. Sadowski, M. Saito, S. Yaginuma, Y. Fujikawa, T. Kogure, T. Ohno, Y. Hasegawa, S. Hasegawa, T. Sakurai, Phys. Rev. Lett. 2004, 93, 105501;

f) E. E. Foos, R. M. Stroud, A. D. Berry, A. W. Snow, J. P. Armistead, J. Am. Chem. Soc. 2000, 122, 7114.

J. Kang, J. D. Wood, S. A. Wells, J.-H. Lee, X. Liu, K.-S. Chen, M. C. Hersam, ACS Nano 2015, 9, 3596.

V. S. Dharmadhikari, S. R. Sainkar, S. Badrinarayan, A. Goswami, J. Electron Spectrosc. Relat. Phenom. 1982, 25, 181.