Epitaxial Growth of Two-Dimensional Magnetic Lateral and Vertical Heterostructures

Abstract

Two-dimensional (2D) magnetic heterostructures provide ideal platforms for manipulating the spin degree of freedom, exploring interfacial coupling effects, and exploiting novel spintronic devices. However, controlled synthesis of magnetic heterostructures remains challenging, especially for magnetic lateral heterostructures. Here, we synthesize magnetic lateral and vertical heterostructures via chemical vapor deposition. The lateral and vertical antiferromagnetic–ferromagnetic non-van der Waals (vdWs) α-MnSe/Cr₂Se₃ heterostructures can be selectively attained by tuning the vapor concentrations of precursors. The lateral heterostructures manifest sharp and contaminant-free interfaces without obvious extended defects. Moreover, a non-vdWs/non-vdWs lateral heterostructure at the 2D limit (～1 nm) is grown. The vertical heterostructures exhibit uniform and highly ordered superlattices, indicating the high quality of the moiré superlattices. We further apply this heteroepitaxial growth approach to synthesize non-vdWs/vdWs magnetic heterostructures, including α-MnSe/graphene and α-MnSe/MoS₂. Our work paves the way for the scalable synthesis of two-dimensional lateral and vertical magnetic heterostructures for fundamental studies and potential device applications.