Authors: Zhouyang Wang | Yiran Ding | Mengqi Zeng | Lei Fu
Source: Chinese Science Bulletin (Chinese Version) (article, 2023-08-18)
Field: Materials Science — Materials Chemistry

Atomic manufacturing of advanced materials <p indent="0mm">When the dimension of matter is reduced from the three dimensions to low dimensions or even single-atom scale, distinctive features can be observed, indicating broad application prospects in variety fields, such as energy storage and conversion, topological nanocomponents, and semiconductors. Developing smaller-scale, higher-precision manufacturing methods can greatly improve material properties, utilization, and integration, resulting in more efficient and smarter products and systems. Nanomanufacturing has made remarkable progress over the past decades. However, it faces enormous technical obstacles in going from the nanoscale to the atomic scale of the product size and production precision. At the right time, atomic manufacturing emerges, in which atoms are directly manipulated by physical assembly or chemical reaction. Atomic manufacturing presents a novel manufacturing approach that uses atoms as the basic unit and guides their construction or reaction on demand by managing their interactions. As a result, obtaining atomically exact products is a corollary of atomic manufacturing. Furthermore, atomic manufacturing is not simply a scale and precision extension of nanomanufacturing, but the direct manipulation of atoms to produce novel materials, devices, and systems. This manufacturing capability will make it easier to reveal deep mechanisms, which will guide the achievement of accurate material synthesis and performance modification on demand. Physical assembly and chemical reaction are the two broad categories of atomic manufacturing strategies. The former mainly uses probes or electron beams to manipulate atomic assembly or rearrangement, whereas the later directs atoms to react in a specified direction. Although the product can be obtained exactly, the efficiency of physical approaches is far too low for most practical applications such as catalysis, batteries, biomedicine, and so on. As a result, this review describes the implementation of atomic manufacturing from a structural design standpoint in single atoms, atom clusters, two-dimensional materials, and high-entropy alloys, with a focus on summarizing the atomic manufacturing process achieved through bottom-up manufacturing using a chemical approach and elucidating the scientific principles involved. Low-dimensional materials have a limited number of atoms in certain dimensions. Because of this structural feature, their properties are particularly sensitive to atom number, arrangement, position, and so on. High-entropy alloys necessitate the atomic-scale combination of multimetallic components. Atomic manufacturing is the only way to achieve the precise fabrication of these materials’ structures and features. As a result, these materials provide an appropriate materials research platform for atomic production. Atomic manufacturing has ushered in a new era of study into these advanced materials, spawning a slew of new research avenues such as novel quantum information devices, electronic/optoelectronic/spin devices, and energy storage and conversion devices. These applications require atomic-level control of materials and device architectures. This review focused on the precise synthesis of materials and devices at the atomic level, highlights the benefits and significance of atomic manufacturing with examples from emerging advanced application domains. Atomic-level functional materials and devices for quantum information technology, two-dimensional materials with unique properties for semiconductor devices, and catalysts with specific chemical environments for energy conversion are among the uses. At present, atomic manufacturing is in its early stages and confronts numerous hurdles. This review summarizes the current progress and puts forward the future development direction of atomic manufacturing. Psychology MXene and MAX Phase Materials ; 2D Materials and Applications ; Perovskite Materials and Applications