MBE

The University of Nottingham unveiled its new Molecular Beam Epitaxy (MBE) machine, capable of reaching the high temperatures required to grow graphene and boron nitride layers on an industrial scale. This is the first machine of its kind in the world, and the researchers are hoping it will "unlock the full potential of graphene in electronics and optoelectronics".

Over £2m were invested in the design, purchase and other costs of the machine, by the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, The University of Nottingham and the Leverhulme Trust. Professor Sergei Novikov, the lead scientist in this project, stresses that this is indeed a high risk project, but one that could potentially change paradigms toward growing large-area graphene and boron-nitride sheets by bonding together carbon atoms at high temperatures.

Researchers from the SLAC lan in Stanford University developed a new method to make 2D material molybdenum diselenide or MoSe₂ that has possible applications in photoelectronic devices, such as light detectors and solar cells, and perhaps also novel electronic devices.

This is the first time single-layer MoSe₂ has been efficiently produced. The method they developed is based on molecular beam epitaxy, and starts with molybdenum and selenium, which are heated in a vacuum chamber until they evaporate. The two elements combined as a thin film. By tweaking the process, they managed to create thin films - one to eight atoms thick. Those sheets were grown on graphene substrates. 

Veeco Instruments announced that the University of Nottingham in the UK purchased two GENxplor R&D Molecular Beam Epitaxy (MBE) Systems for its School of Physics and Astronomy. The University will use the systems to grow high-quality large-area graphene and boron nitride for electronic and optoelectronic applications.

Veeco's MBE systems can deposit epitaxial graphene layers on substrates up to 3" in diameter. The company says that their vertical chamber technology enables them to build smaller MBE systems - up to 40% smaller than the competition. The MBE is an open architecture that provides convenient access to effusion cells and e-beam sources.

The UK's Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC) awarded the University of Nottingham with £1.3 million (just over $2 million) that will be used to buy a new molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) system. This new system will enable the growth of high quality, large area layers of graphene and boron nitride.

Researchers from the University plan to study new materials based on graphene and boron nitride for electronic and optoelectronic applications.

RIBER announced today that it has sold a Compact 21 system to the Innovation of High Performance Microelectronics (IHP) laboratory in Germany.

The system sold to IHP will thus be equipped with a gas injector and be devoted to the development of graphene-based applications. Compact 21 is the MBE research system that has sold the most units in the world. It is highly flexible and offers great adaptability to meet the most demanding specifications of applied research on compound semi-conductor materials.