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Local strain, as a small degree and single direction strain method, can effectively regulate the structures and electronic properties of armchair Janus MoSSe nanoribbon, so that the system can be transformed from the original 0.467 eV indirect band gap into 0.259 eV (3-zig), 0.117 eV (3-arm), 0.080 eV (6-arm) and 0.139 eV (9-zig) direct band gap semiconductor according to the different strain degrees and directions. Compared with traditional MoS2 and MoSe2 nanoribbons, Janus MoSSe nanoribbon shows relatively stable band structure under local strain. The structures and electronic properties of Janus MoSSe nanoribbon are anisotropic when the local strain along different directions. Due to the broken mirror symmetry of Janus system and the appearance of in-plane local polarization, the spin polarization effect of Janus nanoribbon under local strain is more remarkable. When the local strain degree C = 0.167 along the zigzag direction and the local strain C ≥ 0.056 along the armchair direction, the Janus nanoribbon exhibits half-metallic property and surprisingly induces magnetic moment. For the local strain along the direction of armchair, the total magnetic moment of the system can be up to 2.05 μB when C = 0.111. To sum up, a local strain method is applied to the nanoribbon system, which can effectively regulate the geometric configuration and electronic structure without external doping, and introduce magnetism, providing the possibility for expanding nanoribbons as potential nanoelectronics and spintronic material.

Inspired by potential application prospects of spintronics and valleytronics, a novel heterobilayer Janus structure is designed by replacing the chalcogenide atomic layers in the original bilayer MoS2. Based on first-principles calculations, it is found that the SMoS/SeMoS structure exhibits a direct band-gap semiconductor and a typical type-II band alignment with longer carrier lifetime. The transition metal (TM) atom represented by V/Cr/Mn can be stably adsorbed on the heterobilayer Janus SMoS/SeMoS sheet and effectively introduce magnetic moments (m). The calculation results demonstrate that the most stable adsorption site of the TM atom is CX(A), and the TM (V/Cr/Mn) adatom modified SMoS/SeMoS system is converted into metal (V-) or half-metal (Cr/Mn-), respectively. Under the coupling of different indirect exchange interactions, the structure exhibits stable intrinsic anti-ferromagnetic interactions for V-SMoS/SeMoS and ferromagnetic ground state for Cr/Mn-SMoS/SeMoS, respectively, and the magnetic transition temperature (T c) reaches a high temperature or even room temperature. Moreover, the robust out-of-plane magnetocrystalline anisotropy energy ensures stable long-range magnetic order. Specifically, the combination of spin injection and strong spin–orbit coupling interaction effectively breaks the time-reversal symmetry, which leads to valley polarization of the system. Based on this, the biaxial strain can effectively regulate the electronic structure, magnetic properties and valley polarization of TM-SMoS/SeMoS nanosheets with double breaking of spatial-inversion and time-reversal symmetry.

2D photocatalytic TiO2/MoS2 hybrid nanosheets (HNs) have been prepared via a facile hydrothermal process. X-ray diffraction patterns and Raman spectra are carried out and confirm a well crystalized anatase and 2H-MoS2 hybridization. Additional morphological and microstructural tests verify a distinct MoS2 framework, indicating the relatively stability of the MoS2 nanosheet platform with a high specific surface area. UV–vis spectra and electrochemical impedance spectra exhibit an enhanced light absorption ability and conductivity of TiO2/MoS2 compared to that of just TiO2. Photoelectrochemical (PEC) tests also demonstrate the photocurrent of 20 : 1 TiO2/MoS2 HNs is greatly improved compared to that of as-prepared TiO2. The saturation current density is about 33 µA cm−2 when the applied potential is 0.2 V, which is nearly twice that of pure TiO2 and four times as high as 5 : 1 TiO2/MoS2 HNs and 1 : 1 TiO2/MoS2 HNs. Besides that, the duration test exhibits no detectable distinction after processing 25 cycles. The improved photocatalytic activities are perhaps derived from the high conductivity and the increased active sites for the introduction of co-catalytic MoS2 nanosheets as well as the positive synergetic effect between the TiO2 and MoS2. This work demonstrates that the as-prepared TiO2/MoS2 HNs may have a great potential application in PEC hydrogen production.

Based on first-principles calculations in the framework of van der Waals density functional theory, we investigate the structural, electronic properties and band-gap tuning of the h-BN/MoS2/h-BN sandwich heterostructure under an external electric field. We find that, different from the suspended monolayer MoS2 with a direct band-gap, h-BN/MoS2/h-BN has an indirect band-gap. Particular attention has been focused on the engineering of the band-gap of the h-BN/MoS2/h-BN heterostructure via application of an external electric field. With the increase of electric field, the band-gap of the h-BN/MoS2/h-BN heterostructure undergoes an indirect-to-direct band-gap transition. Once the electric field intensity is larger than 0.1 V A−1, the gap value of direct band-gap shrinks almost linearly with the field-strength, which indicates that the h-BN/MoS2/h-BN heterostructure is a viable candidate for optoelectronic applications.

We have carried out first-principles calculations and theoretical analysis to explore the structural and electronic properties of MoS2/n-h-BN heterostructures consisting of monolayer MoS2 on top of h-BN substrates with one to five layers. We find that the MoS2/n-h-BN heterostructures show indirect bandgap features with both of CBM (in the K point) and VBM (in the ? point) localized on the monolayer MoS2. Difference charge density and surface bands indicate there is no obvious charge exchange in the heterostructure systems. We show that the changes from a direct bandgap in monolayer free-stranding MoS2 to an indirect bandgap in MoS2/n-h-BN heterostructure is induced by the strain. Moreover, we find that the bandgaps of MoS2/n-h-BN heterostructures decrease with increasing number of h-BN layers, which is proposed to result from the different strain distributions in MoS2 due to the varieties of lattice mismatch rates between MoS2 and h-BN layers. Our results suggest that the MoS2/n-h-BN heterostructure could serve as a prototypical example for band structure engineering of 2D crystals with atomic layer precision.