Since the discovery of mechanically exfoliated graphene in 2004, research on ultrathin two-dimensional (2D) nanomaterials has grown exponentially in the fields of condensed matter physics, material science, chemistry, and nanotechnology. Highlighting their compelling physical, chemical, electronic, and optical properties, as well as their various potential applications, in this Review, we summarize the state-of-art progress on the ultrathin 2D nanomaterials with a particular emphasis on their recent advances. First, we introduce the unique advances on ultrathin 2D nanomaterials, followed by the description of their composition and crystal structures. The assortments of their synthetic methods are then summarized, including insights on their advantages and limitations, alongside some recommendations on suitable characterization techniques. We also discuss in detail the utilization of these ultrathin 2D nanomaterials for wide ranges of potential applications among the electronics/optoelectronics, electrocatalysis, batteries, supercapacitors, solar cells, photocatalysis, and sensing platforms. Finally, the challenges and outlooks in this promising field are featured on the basis of its current development.

Phase control plays an important role in the precise synthesis of inorganic materials, as the phase structure has a profound influence on properties such as conductivity and chemical stability. Phase-controlled preparation has been challenging for the metallic-phase group-VI transition metal dichalcogenides (the transition metals are Mo and W, and the chalcogens are S, Se and Te), which show better performance in electrocatalysis than their semiconducting counterparts. Here, we report the large-scale preparation of micrometre-sized metallic-phase 1T'-MoX (X = S, Se)-layered bulk crystals in high purity. We reveal that 1T'-MoS crystals feature a distorted octahedral coordination structure and are convertible to 2H-MoS following thermal annealing or laser irradiation. Electrochemical measurements show that the basal plane of 1T'-MoS is much more active than that of 2H-MoS for the electrocatalytic hydrogen evolution reaction in an acidic medium.

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Ag@MoS2 core-shell heterostructure as SERS platform to reveal the hydrogen evolution active sites of single-layer MoS2

The methodology employed here utilizes the sodium super ion conductor type sodium iron phosphate wrapped with conducting carbon network to generate a stable Fe /Fe redox   couple, thereby exhibiting higher operating voltage and energy density of sodium-ion batteries. This new class of sodium iron phosphate wrapped by carbon also displays a cycling stability with >96% capacity retention after 200 cycles.

Two-dimensional (2D) semiconductors have demonstrated great potential in modern nanotechnologies across a variety of research fields, including (opto-)­electronics, spintronics, and electro-/photocatalysis. Interestingly, the vast majority of 2D semiconductors, such as the widely explored transition-metal dichalcogenides, are n-type or ambipolar. The search for p-type 2D semiconductors in the past decade has succeeded in identifying only a few promising candidate materials. In this Perspective, we discuss various strategies to obtain p-type conduction in normally n-type or ambipolar 2D semiconductors and, more importantly, the direct synthesis of p-type 2D semiconductors such as black phosphorus, 2D tellurium, and, most recently, α-MnS.

As a source of clean energy, a reliable hydrogen evolution reaction (HER) requires robust and highly efficient catalysts. Here, by combining chemical vapor transport and Li-intercalation, we have prepared a series of 1T'-phase ReSSe ( x = 0-1) nanodots to achieve high-performance HER in acid medium. Among them, the 1T'-phase ReSSe nanodot exhibits the highest hydrogen evolution activity, with a Tafel slope of 50.1 mV dec and a low overpotential of 84 mV at current density of 10 mA cm. The excellent hydrogen evolution activity is attributed to the optimal hydrogen absorption energy of the active site induced by the asymmetric S vacancy in the highly asymmetric 1T' crystal structure.

Layered van der Waals (vdW) materials, consisting of atomically thin layers, are of paramount importance in physics, chemistry, and materials science owing to their unique properties and various promising applications. However, their fast and large-scale growth via a general approach is still a big challenge, severely limiting their practical implementations. Here, we report a universal method for rapid (~60 min) and large-scale (gram scale) growth of phase-pure, high-crystalline layered vdW materials from their elementary powders via microwave plasma heating in sealed ampoules. This method can be used for growth of 30 compounds with different components (binary, ternary, and quaternary) and properties. The ferroelectric and transport properties of mechanically exfoliated flakes validate the high crystal quality of the grown materials. Our study provides a general strategy for the fast and large-scale growth of layered vdW materials with appealing physiochemical properties, which could be used for various promising applications.