Formation of antimonene nanoribbons by molecular beam epitaxy

Abstract

Owing to its unique band structure, the buckled two-dimensional (2D) honeycomb lattice of antimony, popularly known as antimonene, is predicted to exhibit exotic electronic properties, with potential applications in (opto-)electronics, spintronics, thermoelectrics and photovoltaics. While these attractive attributes of antimonene have been long established by detailed theoretical investigations, exfoliation and epitaxy of this 2D crystal are still in their early stages. Here we report the formation of multilayer antimonene nanoribbons on sapphire substrates by molecular beam epitaxy and post-growth in-situ thermal annealing. These nanoribbons crystallize in the β allotropic form and extend to lengths of few microns. The formation of these nanoribbons may be attributed to thermodynamic shape transition, enabled by the enhanced adatom mobility at the high annealing temperature.