2024 Theses Doctoral

Frustrated hopping in an air-stable van der Waals metal

Koay, Christie Suyi

The 2D honeycomb lattice started as a theoretical construct, until its realization in a crystalline system enabled the study of a host novel exotic phenomena arising from its unique electronic structure. Since the isolation of graphene, the search for crystalline materials hosting interesting electronic structures has only increased with the excitement of correlated phenomena that can arise in the two-dimensional limit.

This dissertation details the characterization of a van der Waals (vdW) material that realizes a novel flat band lattice model via frustrated hopping.

Chapter 1 starts with an introduction into vdW materials and the electronic structure of frustrated lattices. Chapter 2 goes through some of the characterization methods that will be mentioned in this dissertation. Chapter 3 introduces the material that will be the subject of investigation in this thesis and establishes its as arising from a novel flat band lattice model via frustrated hopping. Chapter 4 discusses the electronic properties of newly synthesized analogs of this material. Chapter 5 introduces potential applications of this material in plasmonics. Chapter 6 covers a research story that is independent of the rest of this dissertation. It goes through the optical properties that arise from in-plane structural anisotropy in a superatomic vdW material.