Superior Dielectric Screening in Two-Dimensional MoS₂ Spirals

Metals have the best dielectric screening capability among all materials; however, it is usually difficult to fabricate continuous and uniform ultrathin (few-atomic-layer thickness) metal films. Conversely, high-quality atomic-thick semiconductor or semimetal materials (so called two-dimensional materials) such as graphene or MoS₂ can be readily obtained and robust in ambient conditions; however, their dielectric screening capabilities are greatly reduced by their reduced dimensionality. Particularly, in the vertical direction, the dielectric screening of two-dimensional materials is insufficient; thus, the performances of devices by two-dimensional materials were easily affected by the coulomb-scattering or other kind of sources. Herein, we propose that with a screw dislocation connecting the van der Waals layers in two-dimensional MoS₂ spiral structures, excellent dielectric screening in the vertical direction can be achieved. Our Kelvin force microscopy directly demonstrates that the external impurity charges can be perfectly screened by a theoretically minimum number of layers (two layers) in the MoS₂ spirals. This spiral structure-assisted screening approach paves new way to the design of high-performance ultrathin electrical and optical devices.