Scientists shuffle the deck to create materials with new quantum behaviors

Layered transition metal dichalcogenides or TMDCs—materials composed of metal nanolayers sandwiched between two other layers of chalcogens— have become extremely attractive to the research community due to their ability to exfoliate into 2-D single layers. Similar to graphene, they not only retain some of the unique properties of the bulk material, but also demonstrate direct-gap semiconducting behavior, excellent electrocatalytic activity and unique quantum phenomena such as charge density waves (CDW).