Engineering MoS2–MoTe2 heterojunctions: Enhancing piezoresponse and rectification

Piezoelectric materials play a vital role in energy harvesting, piezotronics, and various self-powered sensing applications. The piezoelectric strength of 2D materials is limited by the carrier charge screening, leading to reduced open-circuit voltages and poor piezotronic performances. Reducing the carrier screening in devices is a key requirement to fully utilize the potential of 2D materials for piezoelectric applications. In this work, we demonstrate that lateral heterojunction devices fabricated on flexible substrates offer an excellent way to improve the piezoelectric open-circuit voltages and rectification ratios. Because of the asymmetric contacts with nickel (Ni/Au) electrodes, the heterojunctions of monolayer (1L) MoS2 and MoTe2 form a hybrid Schottky/p–n diode. We demonstrate a rectification ratio of more than 5000 without electrostatic gating. We observed that devices with higher junction potentials exhibit piezoelectric open-circuit voltages exceeding 1 V and a peak power density of 690 mW/m2. The output characteristics reveal a trade-off between open-circuit voltages and rectification ratios. These findings and the role of built-in (cut-in) voltages in energy harvesting provide valuable insights for the design of piezotronic junctions to achieve high piezoelectric output and/or rectification ratios. Design aspects of heterojunctions discussed in this article can be applied to other emerging nanomaterials.