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Nano Research 2019, 12(6): 1333-1338 https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-019-2295-x
Research Article | Issue | Published: 29 May 2019

High-pressure triggered quantum tunneling tuning through classical percolation in a single nanowire of a binary composite

Show Author's Information Sudeshna Samanta1,2,  Mokwon Lee3,  Deok-Soo Kim3,  Jaeyong Kim2,  Lin Wang1( )
Center for High Pressure Science & Technology Advanced Research,Shanghai,201203,China;
HYU-HPSTAR-CIS High Pressure Research Center,Department of Physics, Hanyang University,Seoul,04763,Republic of Korea;
Voronoi Diagram Research Center, School of Mechanical Engineering,Hanyang University,Seoul,04763,Republic of Korea;
Keywords:
high pressure, Voronoi diagram, electrical transport, single metal-carbon nanowire
Topics:
Carbon compositesElectric conductivityMetalsNanowiresQuantum chemistry Solvents
Cite this article:
Samanta S, Lee M, Kim D-S, et al. High-pressure triggered quantum tunneling tuning through classical percolation in a single nanowire of a binary composite. Nano Research, 2019, 12(6): 1333-1338. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-019-2295-x
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Abstract Full text Electronic supplementary material About this article

In the era of miniaturization, the one-dimensional nanostructures presented numerous possibilities to realize operational nanosensors and devices by tuning their electrical transport properties. Upon size reduction, the physical properties of materials become extremely challenging to characterize and understand due to the complex interplay among structures, surface properties, strain effects, distribution of grains, and their internal coupling mechanism. In this report, we demonstrate the fabrication of a single metal-carbon composite nanowire inside a diamond- anvil-cell and examine the in situ pressure-driven electrical transport properties. The nanowire manifests a rapid and reversible pressure dependence of the strong nonlinear electrical conductivity with significant zero-bias differential conduction revealing a quantum tunneling dominant carrier transport mechanism. We fully rationalize our observations on the basis of a metal-carbon framework in a highly compressed nanowire corroborating a quantum-tunneling boundary, in addition to a classical percolation boundary that exists beyond the percolation threshold. The structural phase progressions were monitored to evidence the pressure-induced shape reconstruction of the metallic grains and modification of their intergrain interactions for successful explanation of the electrical transport behavior. The pronounced sensitivity of electrical conductivity to an external pressure stimulus provides a rationale to design low-dimensional advanced pressure sensing devices.


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About this article

High-pressure triggered quantum tunneling tuning through classical percolation in a single nanowire of a binary composite

Show Author's information Sudeshna Samanta1,2, Mokwon Lee3, Deok-Soo Kim3, Jaeyong Kim2, Lin Wang1( )
Center for High Pressure Science & Technology Advanced Research,Shanghai,201203,China;
HYU-HPSTAR-CIS High Pressure Research Center,Department of Physics, Hanyang University,Seoul,04763,Republic of Korea;
Voronoi Diagram Research Center, School of Mechanical Engineering,Hanyang University,Seoul,04763,Republic of Korea;

Abstract

In the era of miniaturization, the one-dimensional nanostructures presented numerous possibilities to realize operational nanosensors and devices by tuning their electrical transport properties. Upon size reduction, the physical properties of materials become extremely challenging to characterize and understand due to the complex interplay among structures, surface properties, strain effects, distribution of grains, and their internal coupling mechanism. In this report, we demonstrate the fabrication of a single metal-carbon composite nanowire inside a diamond- anvil-cell and examine the in situ pressure-driven electrical transport properties. The nanowire manifests a rapid and reversible pressure dependence of the strong nonlinear electrical conductivity with significant zero-bias differential conduction revealing a quantum tunneling dominant carrier transport mechanism. We fully rationalize our observations on the basis of a metal-carbon framework in a highly compressed nanowire corroborating a quantum-tunneling boundary, in addition to a classical percolation boundary that exists beyond the percolation threshold. The structural phase progressions were monitored to evidence the pressure-induced shape reconstruction of the metallic grains and modification of their intergrain interactions for successful explanation of the electrical transport behavior. The pronounced sensitivity of electrical conductivity to an external pressure stimulus provides a rationale to design low-dimensional advanced pressure sensing devices.

Keywords: high pressure, Voronoi diagram, electrical transport, single metal-carbon nanowire

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Publication history
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Acknowledgements

Publication history

Received: 13 November 2018
Revised: 24 December 2018
Accepted: 03 January 2019
Published: 29 May 2019
Issue date: June 2019

Copyright

© Tsinghua University Press and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2019

Acknowledgements

Acknowledgements

This work was mainly supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 11874076), the National Science Associated Funding (NSAF) (No. U1530402), and Science Challenging Program (No. TZ2016001). S. S. would also like to thank Dr. Christophe Thissieu from Almax easyLab Inc, MA, Cambridge, USA for providing the designer diamond anvils for the experiments. S. S. would like to thank Dr. Ankita Ghatak, S. N. Bose National Centre for Basic Sciences, Kolkata, India for the analysis and discussion on HRTEM data.

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