In the Nano Letters journal published probably the most detailed review of the properties of two-dimensional diamond, or diamane. The review contains 106 references to papers devoted to this topic. The review discusses the properties of diamane, the problems of its synthesis and outlines the prospects for this field, at the crossroads of the timeless diamond and decade-old graphene.
The paper was published in Nano Letters 21, 5475–5484 (2021)
Diamond is certainly one of the most famous minerals, not only a beautiful piece of jewelry but also a crystal with a variety of unique faculties. Diamond is the hardest and stiffest, with the highest room-temperature thermal conductivity, and one of the lowest thermal expansion coefficients among existing materials. Furthermore, it is radiation-hard and chemically inert. All of this makes diamond an attractive material for use in high-power electronic devices, feasibly functioning under extreme conditions. No wonder since graphene (two-dimensional analogue of graphite) was produced scientists have been investigating the possibility of producing diamane, a two-dimensional (2D) diamond.
With the developments in the field of 2D materials, nowadays of growing interest is synthesis and investigation of 2D diamond, whose potential properties--if it is readily produced--put it in par with the most promising nanostructures such as graphene, h-BN or MoS2. However, in contrast to these iconic 2D materials, synthesis of 2D diamond is a tricky process, as its formation is hindered by the graphitization effects causing instability at nanoscale.
The figure shows the evolution of carbon based structures, from bilayered graphene (left part of the figure), which connection with reference atoms leads to the formation of two-dimensional diamond (middle), that, in turn, can be used as a basis for crystal growth (right).
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