A remarkable dependence of the friction force on carrier concentration was found on doped silicon substrates. The sample was a nearly intrinsic n-type Si(100) wafer patterned with 2-micrometer-wide stripes of highly B-doped p-type material. The counter surface was the tip of an atomic force microscope coated with conductive titanium nitride. The local carrier concentration was controlled throug...

By applying the nonequilibrium Green's functions and the density-functional theory, we investigate the electronic structures and transport properties of fluorinated zigzag-edged boron nitride nanoribbons. The results show that the transition between half-metal and semiconductor in zigzag-edged boron nitride nanoribbons can be realized by fluorination at different sites or by the change of the f...

We have measured the second order correlation function [g^{(2)}(τ)] of the cathodoluminescence intensity resulting from the excitation by fast electrons of defect centers in wide band-gap semiconductor nanocrystals of diamond and hexagonal boron nitride. We show that the cathodoluminescence second order correlation function g^{(2)}(τ) of multiple defect centers is dominated by a large, nanoseco...

The isolation of graphene, now over a decade ago, has given rise to the revitalization of many two-dimensional materials (2DM). The 2DM materials under investigation, in addition to graphene, include hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN), semiconducting, metallic, and superconducting transition metal dichalcogenides (TMD). Graphene has received a lot of attention because of its superior physical and c...

Despite the markedly low chemical reactivity of the nonpolar (110) surfaces of III−V semiconductors, the covalent functionalization of GaP(110) surfaces with perfluorophenyl azide (PFPA) molecules by a Staudinger-type reaction occurs only slightly above room temperature (325 K). Scanning tunneling microscopy observations, combined with density functional theory calculations, support the formati...

Rare earth (RE) ion luminescence has long been used in laser and optical fiber communications technology. Bulk RE doped oxides were widely used in color phosphors for Cathode Ray Tubes. The wide band gap (WBG) semiconductors and insulators have been used for visible emission at 300 K from RE ions since the reports first by Zanata (Zanatta and Nunes 1998) for Er in silicon nitride (photoluminesc...

Boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs) [ 1,2 ] and boron nitride nanosheets (BNNSs) [ 3 ] have gained increasing attention for their structural similarity to carbon nanotubes (CNTs) and graphene, respectively. These BN nanostructures are wide-bandgap materials ( ∼ 6 eV), and their electronic properties are different from those of CNTs and graphene. In addition, BNNTs and BNNSs offer intriguing propert...

In the May 2002 Issue of this Magazine, Late Lester F. Eastman and Umesh K. Mishra made case for what was then a long-shot technology in world power semiconductors: gallium nitride (GaN). They presented an optimistic outlook powerful, rugged radio-frequency amplifiers then-nascent broadband wireless networks radar, as well power-switching applications electric grid. called GaN devices “the toug...