Stability and electronic properties of silicene on WSe2

Abstract

Many semiconducting substrates, such as GaS and MgBr₂, have been explored for silicene. However, large lattice mismatches, complicated control of terminal layers and small band gaps are critical limiting factors. First-principles results on the stability and electronic properties of silicene on WSe₂ show that the energy barriers for lateral translation between the two subsystems are very small due to weak van der Waals interactions. For the same reason, the Dirac physics of silicene is preserved. It turns out that the induced band gap is sufficient to withstand thermal fluctuations.