arXiv subjects

Nianjie Liang

Publications and source records attributed to Nianjie Liang.

6 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2026

Invariant ionic conductance in an atomically thin polar nanopore

Ion channels regulate many essential properties of biological cells, especially the membrane potential. Despite decades of efforts on artificial channels, it remains a great challenge to mimic the dipole potential-an indispensable constituent of the membrane potential, due to its angstrom-scale characteristic length. Here, we explore nanopores in monolayer molybdenum sulfide selenide (MoSSe) considering its intrinsic dipole and atomic thickness. Remarkably, an invariant ionic conductance was observed over salt concentrations spanning six orders of magnitude, distinct from all known conductance-concentration scaling laws and reminiscent of the current saturation in cell membranes at high concentrations. Molecular dynamics simulations revealed the fundamental role of the dipole-modulated dielectric properties of nanoconfined water. Our findings highlight an exotic conductance scaling law and open up a novel avenue for controlling ion transport in unprecedented ways.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2026

Intrinsically ultralow thermal conductivity in all-inorganic superatomic bulk crystals

Superatomic compounds, composed of atomic clusters interwoven by weak chemical bonds exhibit large anharmonicity vibrations, are excellent candidates for ultralow thermal conductivity (\k{appa}) materials. However, growing bulk superatomic single crystals is challenging due to complex chemical composition and chemical bonds, and studies on their intrinsic thermal property are scarce. Here, we grew high-quality superatomic single crystals of Re6Se8Te7 and Re6Te15, both of which are narrow band gap semiconductors that change into metals under external physical pressure. At room-temperature, the \k{appa} are 0.32 W m-1 K-1 and 0.53 W m-1 K-1 in Re6Se8Te7 and Re6Te15, respectively, ranking among the lowest value reported in all-inorganic bulk crystals. It is mainly attributed to the large Grüneisen parameter (1.93) and low average sound speed (< 1482 m/s), which are due to soft Te7 nets weakly embedded among the rigid Re6Se8 (Re6Te8) quasi-cubic clusters. The appearance of boson peak, i. e., hump of C(T)/T3, verifies the existence of disordered phonon transports. Besides, the temperature dependence of \k{appa} can be described by classic Debye-Callaway model. Notably, above 350 K, the \k{appa} values of Re6Se8Te7 and Re6Te15 are remarkably close to the upper limit derived from glassy-like diffusion model. This finding sets the superatomic compounds as a promising family for searching ultralow-\k{appa} and energy management materials.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2025

Ultrahigh interfacial thermal conductance for cooling gallium oxide electronics using cubic boron arsenide

Gallium oxide (Ga$_2$O$_3$) has attracted significant interest for its unique potential especially in power electronics. However, its low and anisotropic thermal conductivity poses a major challenge for heat dissipation. Here, we explore an effective cooling strategy centering on the heterogeneous integration of $β$-Ga$_2$O$_3$ devices with cubic boron arsenide (cBAs), an emerging material with an ultrahigh thermal conductivity $κ$ of ~1300 Wm$^{-1}$K$^{-1}$. Machine-learned potentials for representative $β$-Ga$_2$O$_3$/cBAs interfaces are trained, enabling accurate and efficient calculation of the interfacial thermal conductance $G$ via nonequilibrium molecular dynamics. At 300 K, remarkable $G$ values of 749$\pm$33 MWm$^{-2}$K$^{-1}$ and 824$\pm$35 MWm$^{-2}$K$^{-1}$ are predicted for Ga-As and O-B bonding across the interface, respectively, which are primarily attributed to the well-matched phonon density of states considering the similar Debye temperatures of $β$-Ga$_2$O$_3$ and cBAs. Moreover, finite-element simulations directly show a notable device temperature reduction when comparing cBAs with other substrates. The simultaneously ultrahigh $κ$ and $G$ highlight cBAs as an ideal substrate for Ga$_2$O$_3$ electronics.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2024

Insight into the effect of force error on the thermal conductivity from machine-learned potentials

Machine-learned potentials (MLPs) have been extensively used to obtain the lattice thermal conductivity via atomistic simulations. However, the impact of force errors in various MLPs on thermal transport has not been widely recognized and remains to be fully understood. Here, we employ MLP-driven molecular dynamics (MD) and anharmonic lattice dynamics (LD) to systematically investigate how the calculated thermal conductivity varies with the force errors, using boron arsenide as a prototypical material. We consistently observe an underestimation of thermal conductivity in MD simulations with three different MLPs including the neuroevolution potential, deep potential, and moment tensor potential. We provide a robust extrapolation scheme based on controlled force noises via the Langevin thermostat to correct this underestimation. The corrected results achieve a good agreement with previous experimental measurement from 200 K to 600 K. In contrast, the thermal conductivity values from LD calculations with MLPs readily align with the experimental data, which is attributed to the much smaller effects of the force errors on the force-constant calculations.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2024

Phonon heat conduction across slippery interfaces in twisted graphite

Interlayer rotation in van der Waals (vdW) materials offers great potential for manipulating phonon dynamics and heat flow in advanced electronics with ever higher compactness and power density. However, despite extensive theoretical efforts in recent years, experimental measurements remain scarce especially due to the critical challenges of preparing single-crystalline twisted interfaces and probing interfacial thermal transport with sufficient resolution. Here, we exploited the intrinsic twisted interfaces in highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG). By developing novel experimental schemes based on microfabricated mesas, we managed to achieve simultaneous mechanical characterizations and thermal measurements. In particular, we pushed the HOPG mesas with a microprobe to identify and rotate single-crystalline intrinsic interfaces owing to their slippery nature as is well known in structural superlubricity. Remarkably, we observed over 30-fold suppression of thermal conductance for the slippery interfaces by using epitaxial graphite as a control. Nonetheless, the interfacial conductance remains around 600 $\mathrm{MWm^{-2}K^{-1}}$ which surpasses the highest values for artificially stacked vdW structures by more than five times. Further, atomic simulations revealed the predominant role of the transverse acoustic phonons. Together, our findings highlight a general physical picture that directly correlates interfacial thermal transport with sliding resistance, and lay the foundation for twist-enabled thermal management which are particularly beneficial to twistronics and slidetronics.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2024

Thermal transport in a 2D amorphous material

Two-dimensional (2D) crystals proved revolutionary soon after graphene was discovered in 2004. However, 2D amorphous materials only became accessible in 2020 and remain largely unexplored. In particular, the thermophysical properties of amorphous materials are of great interest upon transition from 3D to 2D. Here, we probe thermal transport in 2D amorphous carbon. A cross-plane thermal conductivity ($κ$) down to 0.079 $\rm{Wm}^{-1}K^{-1}$ is measured for van der Waals stacked multilayers at room temperature, which is among the lowest reported to date. Meanwhile, an unexpectedly high in-plane $κ$ is obtained for freestanding monolayers which is a few times larger than what is predicted by conventional wisdom for 3D amorphous carbon with similar $\rm{sp}^{2}$ fraction. Our molecular dynamics simulations reveal the role of disorder and highlight the impact of dimensionality. Amorphous materials at the 2D limit open up new avenues for understanding and manipulating heat at the atomic scale.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗