Journal
NATURE MATERIALS
Volume 14, Issue 2, Pages 169-173Publisher
NATURE PUBLISHING GROUP
DOI: 10.1038/NMAT4140
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Funding
- DARPA [W31P4Q-13-1-0005, W911NF-11-1-0300]
- Energy Frontier Research in Extreme Environments (EFree) Center, an Energy Frontier Research Center - US Department of Energy, Office of Science [DE-SC0001057]
- DOE-NNSA [DE-NA0001974]
- DOE-BES [DE-FG02-99ER45775]
- NSF
- US Department of Energy (DOE) Office of Science User Facility operated for the DOE Office of Science by Argonne National Laboratory [DE-AC02-06CH11357]
- WDC Research Fund
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Silicon is ubiquitous in contemporary technology. The most stable form of silicon at ambient conditions takes on the structure of diamond (cF8, d-Si) and is an indirect bandgap semiconductor, which prevents it from being considered as a next-generation platform for semiconductor technologies(1-4). Here, we report the formation of a new orthorhombic allotrope of silicon, Si-24, using a novel two-step synthesis methodology. First, a Na4Si24 precursor was synthesized at high pressure(5); second, sodium was removed from the precursor by a thermal 'degassing' process. The Cmcm structure of Si-24, which has 24 Si atoms per unit cell (oC24), contains open channels along the crystallographic a-axis that are formed from six- and eight-membered sp(3) silicon rings. This new allotrope possesses a quasidirect bandgap near 1.3 eV. Our combined experimental/theoretical study expands the known allotropy for element fourteen and the unique high-pressure precursor synthesis methodology demonstrates the potential for new materials with desirable properties.
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