Research objectives and activities

O2.1) 2D Physics. 2D magnetism is one of the hottest topics in the realm of 2D materials. An exciting research avenue is the development of 2D multiferroic materials and heterostructures that can outperform the state-of the art oxide multiferroics (e.g., BTO). 

Different approaches such as CVT and CVD will be used to grow high quality multiferroic thin crystals and fabricate multiferroic heterostructures (stacking of magnetic 2D and ferroelectric 2D thin layers). 

Experimental work will be guided and rationalized by first-principles calculations involving DFT, tight-binding and orbital-resolved spin Hamiltonians.

O2.2) 2D Chemistry. We propose to bring heterostructures to the next level by providing a chemical strategy for the development of hybrid nanomaterials and chemical heterostructures based on 2D materials (2D-Pnictogens, metal dichalcogenides (TMDs) and phosphochalcogenides) to explore applications in energy storage and conversion.

O2.3) Molecular/2D heterostructures. The design of stimuli-responsive hybrid heterostructures has been recently pioneered at ICMol by combining bistable spin crossover (SCO) nanostructures with 2D materials to develop memory devices (Adv.Mat. 2023, 36, 2307718). The next goal will be to tune through this approach the properties of 2D quantum materials (magnets and superconductors).