In recent years, topological insulators have become one of the hottest topics in physics. These new materials act as both insulators and conductors, with their interior preventing the flow of electrical currents while their edges or surfaces allow the movement of a charge.
Perhaps most importantly, the surfaces of topological insulators enable the transport of spin-polarized electrons while preventing the "scattering" typically associated with power consumption, in which electrons deviate from their trajectory, resulting in dissipation.
Because of such characteristics, these materials hold great potential for use in future transistors, memory devices and magnetic sensors that are highly energy efficient and require less power.
In a study published Feb. 13 in Nature Nanotechnology, researchers from UCLA's Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science and from the materials division of Australia's University of Queensland show the promise of surface-conduction channels in topological insulator nanoribbons made of bismuth telluride and demonstrate that surface states in these nanoribbons are "tunable" able to be turned on and off depending on the position of the Fermi level.
"Our finding enables a variety of opportunities in building potential new-generation, low-dissipation nanoelectronic and spintronic devices, from magnetic sensing to storage," said Kang L. Wang, the Raytheon Professor of Electrical Engineering at UCLA Engineering, whose team carried out the research.
Bismuth telluride is well known as a thermoelectric material and has also been predicted to be a three-dimensional topological insulator with robust and unique surface states. Recent experiments with bismuth telluride bulk materials have also suggested two-dimensional conduction channels originating from the surface states. But it has been a great challenge to modify surface conduction, because of dominant bulk contribution d
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