“…Encouragingly, encapsulation within CNTs has also been used to isolate 1D vdW transition metal trichalcogenides (TMTs) with weak interchain vdW interactions such as NbSe 3 and HfTe 3 into single covalent chains and to stabilize novel TMT metastable phases not accessible through the bulk phase such as NbTe 3 , VTe 3 , and TiTe 3 . , A key enabling factor in stabilizing these structures is the inert vdW environment within the CNT host, which protects the guest structures from ambient air- or chemically induced degradation. As such, encapsulation within CNTs has also been used to access the formation of atomically precise nanoribbon-like monolayer structures, zigzag strips, and even helical chains derived from 2D vdW crystals by protecting the in-plane dangling bonds from oxidation in ambient conditions. ,,, Enabled by the atomic precision of the guest structures inside CNTs, these heterostructures have been used as a reliable platform to investigate the evolution of the photophysics, , electron transport, magnetic interactions, and electron–phonon coupling upon encapsulation of a library of guest structures. ,, We aimed to employ this synthetic strategy to isolate single chains of our model q-1D vdW phase, Sb 2 Se 3 , and use the resulting heterostructure to probe the evolution of the structural attributes and photophysical properties of Sb 2 Se 3 upon encapsulation.…”