Reversible writing of high-mobility and high-carrier-density doping patterns in two-dimensional van der Waals heterostructures

An electron beam technique can be used to write high-resolution doping patterns in graphene and MoS2 van der Waals heterostructures, and could allow doped circuit designs to be created. A key feature of two-dimensional materials is that the sign and concentration of their carriers can be externally controlled with techniques such as electrostatic gating. However, conventional electrostatic gating has limitations, including a maximum carrier density set by the dielectric breakdown, and ionic liquid gating and direct chemical doping also suffer from drawbacks. Here, we show that an electron-beam-induced doping technique can be used to reversibly write high-resolution doping patterns in hexagonal boron nitride-encapsulated graphene and molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) van der Waals heterostructures. The doped MoS2 device exhibits an order of magnitude decrease of subthreshold swing compared with the device before doping, whereas the doped graphene devices demonstrate a previously inaccessible regime of high carrier concentration and high mobility, even at room temperature. We also show that the approach can be used to write high-quality p-n junctions and nanoscale doping patterns, illustrating that the technique can create nanoscale circuitry in van der Waals heterostructures.