Abstract
Interfacial ferroelectricity emerges in non-centrosymmetric heterostructures consisting of non-polar van der Waals (vdW) layers. Ferroelectricity with concomitant Coulomb screening can switch topological currents or superconductivity and simulate synaptic response. So far, it has only been realized in bilayer graphene moiré superlattices, posing stringent requirements to constituent materials and twist angles. Here we report ferroelectricity with concomitant Coulomb screening in different vdW heterostructures free of moiré interfaces containing monolayer graphene, boron nitride (BN) and transition metal chalcogenide layers. We observe a ferroelectric hysteretic response in a BN/monolayer graphene/BN, as well as in BN/WSe2/monolayer graphene/WSe2/BN heterostructure, but also when replacing the stacking fault-containing BN with multilayer twisted MoS2, a prototypical sliding ferroelectric. Our control experiments exclude alternative mechanisms, such that we conclude that ferroelectricity originates from stacking faults in the BN flakes. Hysteretic switching occurs when a conductive ferroelectric screens the gating field electrically and controls the monolayer graphene through its polarization field. Our results relax some of the material and design constraints for device applications based on sliding ferroelectricity and should enable memory device or the combination with diverse vdW materials with superconducting, topological or magnetic properties.
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Data availability
The data that support the findings of this study are available within the article and its Supplementary Information. Any other relevant data are available from the corresponding authors upon reasonable request.
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Acknowledgements
This work was supported by the National Key R&D Program of China (grant numbers 2021YFA1400100 (J.L.) and 2019YFA0307800 (J.L., Z.V.H. and J.M.)), the NSF of China (grant numbers 12374168 (J.L.), 62275265 (C.H.), 12450003 (Z.V.H.), 92265203 (Z.V.H.), 52021001 (B.P.) and 12274090 (W.S.)), the Beijing Natural Science Foundation (grant number 4222084 (C.H.)) and the Natural Science Foundation of Shanghai (grant number 22ZR1406300 (W.S.)). Z.V.H. acknowledges the support of the Fund for Shanxi “1331 Project” Key Subjects Construction, and the support of the Innovation Program for Quantum Science and Technology (grant no. 2021ZD0302003). This research was also supported by the CAS Project for Young Scientists in Basic Research (YSBR-003 (W.Z.)). This research benefited from resources and supports from the Electron Microscopy Center at the University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (W.Z.). We also acknowledge the support from Peking Nanofab (J.L.).
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J.L., Z.V.H. and C.H. conceived the project. R.N., Z.L., X.H. and Z.Q. fabricated devices and performed transport measurements with assistance from Z.W. and C.H.; crystallographic characterization was performed by R.N., Z.L. and Q.L., assisted by K.L. and J.M.; TEM characterization of electrical transport devices and identification of microstructures in boron nitride were carried out by C.W., supervised by W.Z.; TEM characterization of capacitance devices was done by C.Y. and Y.W., supervised by R.C. and B.P.; AFM characterization was performed by M.L., supervised by J.X.; theoretical calculation was done by M.W.; K.W. and T.T. synthesized boron nitride crystals; J.L., Z.V.H., C.H. and Z.G. supervised the project. All authors contributed to the data analysis. R.N., Z.V.H., C.H. and J.L. wrote the paper with input from all authors.
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Niu, R., Li, Z., Han, X. et al. Ferroelectricity with concomitant Coulomb screening in van der Waals heterostructures. Nat. Nanotechnol. 20, 346–352 (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-024-01846-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41565-024-01846-4
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