Ultrafast van der Waals diode using graphene quantum capacitance and Fermi-level depinning

Abstract

Graphene, with superior electrical tunabilities, has arisen as a multifunctional insertion layer in vertically stacked devices. Although the role of graphene inserted in metal-semiconductor junctions has been well investigated in quasi-static charge transport regime, the implication of graphene insertion at ultrahigh frequencies has rarely been considered. Here, we demonstrate the diode operation of vertical Pt/n-MoSe 2 /graphene/Au assemblies at ~200-GHz cutoff frequency (f C ). The electric charge modulation by the inserted graphene becomes essentially frozen above a few GHz frequencies due to graphene quantum capacitance–induced delay, so that the Ohmic graphene/MoSe 2 junction may be transformed to a pinning-free Schottky junction. Our diodes exhibit much lower total capacitance than devices without graphene insertion, deriving an order of magnitude higher f C , which clearly demonstrates the merit of graphene at high frequencies.