Anisotropic electrical properties of aligned PtSe₂ nanoribbon arrays grown by a pre-patterned selective selenization process

This study proposes a feasible and scalable production strategy to naturally obtain aligned platinum diselenide (PtSe₂) nanoribbon arrays with anisotropic conductivity. The anisotropic properties of two-dimensional (2D) materials, especially transition-metal dichalcogenides (TMDs), have attracted great interest in research. The dependence of physical properties on their lattice orientations is of particular interest because of its potential in diverse applications, such as nanoelectronics and optoelectronics. One-dimensional (1D) nanostructures facilitate many feasible production strategies for shaping 2D materials into unidirectional 1D nanostructures, providing methods to investigate the anisotropic properties of 2D materials based on their lattice orientations and dimensionality. The natural alignment of zigzag (ZZ) PtSe₂ nanoribbons is experimentally demonstrated using angle-resolved polarized Raman spectroscopy (ARPRS), and the selective growth mechanism is further theoretically revealed by comparing edges and edge energies of different orientations using the density functional theory (DFT). Back-gate field-effect transistors (FETs) are also constructed of unidirectional PtSe₂ nanoribbons to investigate their anisotropic electrical properties, which align with the results of the projected density of states (DOS) calculations. This work provides new insight into the anisotropic properties of 2D materials and a feasible investigation strategy from experimental and theoretical perspectives.