Inorganic semiconductor nanostructures are ideal systems for exploring a large number of novel phenomena at the nanoscale and investigating the size and dimensionality dependence of their properties for potential applications. The use of such nanostructures with tailored geometries as building blocks is also expected to play crucial roles in future nanodevices. Since the discovery of carbon nanotubes much attention has been paid to exploring the usage of inorganic semiconductor nanostructures as field-emitters due to their low work functions, high aspect ratios and mechanical stabilities, and high electrical and thermal conductivities. This article provides a comprehensive review of the state-of-the-art research activities in the field. It mainly focuses on the most widely studied inorganic nanostructures, such as ZnO, ZnS, Si, WO3, AlN, SiC, and their field-emission properties. We begin with a survey of inorganic semiconductor nanostructures and the field-emission principle, and then discuss the recent progresses on several kinds of important nanostructures and their field-emission characteristics in detail and overview some additional inorganic semiconducting nanomaterials in short. Finally, we conclude this review with some perspectives and outlook on the future developments in this area.

Inorganic semiconductor nanostructures and their field-emission applications

Graphitic carbon nitride (g-C3N4) has gained remarkable acceptance as a visible-light-driven photocatalyst with a distinctive 2D structure and great stability. Owing to its superior features, g-C3N4 has been engaged in various scientific activities for environmental pollution abatement, production and storage of energy, and gas sensors. However, the visible-light efficiency of pure g-C3N4 is very poor and its separation from the phototreated systems is difficult. The most promising method to improve the photocatalytic activity and facilitate separation process is to introduce a magnetic compound over the g-C3N4 sheets. This review has mainly focused on the recent advancement in fabrication, characterization and application of magnetic g-C3N4-based nanocomposites. Accordingly, four primary g-C3N4-based nanocomposites are discussed based on the type of integrated magnetic material. The effects on the structure, physico-chemical properties, photocatalytic activity towards degradation of pollutants, hydrogen generation, solid phase extraction, lithium-ion batteries, gas sensors, and supercapacitors are also discussed in detail.

Review on magnetically separable graphitic carbon nitride-based nanocomposites as promising visible-light-driven photocatalysts

Two-dimensional (2D) materials have generated great interest in the past few years as a new toolbox for electronics. This family of materials includes, among others, metallic graphene, semiconducting transition metal dichalcogenides (such as MoS2), and insulating boron nitride. These materials and their heterostructures offer excellent mechanical flexibility, optical transparency, and favorable transport properties for realizing electronic, sensing, and optical systems on arbitrary surfaces. In this paper, we demonstrate a novel technology for constructing large-scale electronic systems based on graphene/molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) heterostructures grown by chemical vapor deposition. We have fabricated high-performance devices and circuits based on this heterostructure, where MoS2 is used as the transistor channel and graphene as contact electrodes and circuit interconnects. We provide a systematic comparison of the graphene/MoS2 heterojunction contact to more traditional MoS2-metal junctions, as well as a theoretical investigation, using density functional theory, of the origin of the Schottky barrier height. The tunability of the graphene work function with electrostatic doping significantly improves the ohmic contact to MoS2. These high-performance large-scale devices and circuits based on this 2D heterostructure pave the way for practical flexible transparent electronics.

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Graphene-MoS2 Hybrid Technology for Large-Scale Two-Dimensional Electronics

Financial supports from the NSFC (Grant Nos. 11575085, 51602154, 11472131, and 11622218), the Aeronautics Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 2017ZF52066), the Qing Lan Project, Six talent peaks project in Jiangsu Province (Project No. XCL-035), the Jiangsu NSF (BK20160037), the program of China Scholarships Council (Grant No. 201806830013), Funding for Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation in NUAA (BCXJ 18-07), the Open Research Fund of Jiangsu Provincial Key Laboratory for Nanotechnology of Nanjing University, and the Priority Academic Program Development of Jiangsu Higher Education Institutions (PAPD) are gratefully acknowledged.

Defect Engineering in Two Common Types of Dielectric Materials for Electromagnetic Absorption Applications

Owing to their excellent multiplexing ability, high sensitivity, and large dynamic range, immunoassays using surface-enhanced Raman scattering (SERS) as the readout signal have found prosperous applications in fields such as disease diagnosis, environmental surveillance, and food safety supervision. Various ever-increasing demands have promoted SERS-based immunoassays from the classical sandwich-type ones to those integrated with fascinating automatic platforms (e.g., test strips and microfluidic chips). As recent years have witnessed impressive progress in SERS immunoassays, we try to comprehensively cover SERS-based immunoassays from their basic working principles to specific applications. Focusing on several basic elements in SERS immunoassays, typical structures of SERS nanoprobes, productive optical spectral encoding strategies, and popular immunoassay platforms are highlighted, followed by their representative biological applications in the last 5 years. Moreover, despite the vast advances achieved ...

SERS-Activated Platforms for Immunoassay: Probes, Encoding Methods, and Applications

Construction of Z-scheme heterostructure is of great significance for realizing efficient photocatalytic water splitting. However, the conscious modulation of Z-scheme charge transfer is still a great challenge. Herein, interfacial Mo-S bond and internal electric field modulated Z-scheme heterostructure composed by sulfur vacancies-rich ZnIn2S4 and MoSe2 was rationally fabricated for efficient photocatalytic hydrogen evolution. Systematic investigations reveal that Mo-S bond and internal electric field induce the Z-scheme charge transfer mechanism as confirmed by the surface photovoltage spectra, DMPO spin-trapping electron paramagnetic resonance spectra and density functional theory calculations. Under the intense synergy among the Mo-S bond, internal electric field and S-vacancies, the optimized photocatalyst exhibits high hydrogen evolution rate of 63.21 mmol∙g−1·h−1 with an apparent quantum yield of 76.48% at 420 nm monochromatic light, which is about 18.8-fold of the pristine ZIS. This work affords a useful inspiration on consciously modulating Z-scheme charge transfer by atomic-level interface control and internal electric field to signally promote the photocatalytic performance. The construction of Z-scheme heterostructures is of great significance for realizing efficient photocatalytic water splitting. Here, the authors report an interfacial chemical bond and internal electric field modulated Z-Scheme Sv-ZnIn2S4/MoSe2 photocatalyst for efficient hydrogen evolution.

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Interfacial chemical bond and internal electric field modulated Z-scheme Sv-ZnIn2S4/MoSe2 photocatalyst for efficient hydrogen evolution

A High-Energy Density Asymmetric Supercapacitor Based on Fe2O3 Nanoneedle Arrays and NiCo2O4/Ni(OH)2 Hybrid Nanosheet Arrays Grown on SiC Nanowire Networks as Free-Standing Advanced Electrodes

Synthesis and enhanced electromagnetic wave absorption performances of Fe3O4@C decorated walnut shell-derived porous carbon

Preparation and electromagnetic wave absorption performance of Fe3Si/SiC@SiO2 nanocomposites

Investigating noble-metal-free and earth-abundant cocatalysts has emerged as a promising and challenging issue for improving the photocatalytic hydrogen production efficiency. In this work, a novel...

CoNi Bimetal Cocatalyst Modifying a Hierarchical ZnIn2S4 Nanosheet-Based Microsphere Noble-Metal-Free Photocatalyst for Efficient Visible-Light-Driven Photocatalytic Hydrogen Production

Alan Meng

Papers

Interfacial chemical bond and internal electric field modulated Z-scheme Sv-ZnIn2S4/MoSe2 photocatalyst for efficient hydrogen evolution

A High-Energy Density Asymmetric Supercapacitor Based on Fe2O3 Nanoneedle Arrays and NiCo2O4/Ni(OH)2 Hybrid Nanosheet Arrays Grown on SiC Nanowire Networks as Free-Standing Advanced Electrodes

Synthesis and enhanced electromagnetic wave absorption performances of Fe3O4@C decorated walnut shell-derived porous carbon

Preparation and electromagnetic wave absorption performance of Fe3Si/SiC@SiO2 nanocomposites

CoNi Bimetal Cocatalyst Modifying a Hierarchical ZnIn2S4 Nanosheet-Based Microsphere Noble-Metal-Free Photocatalyst for Efficient Visible-Light-Driven Photocatalytic Hydrogen Production