The universe is a gigantic, three-dimensional place, so why study what happens in microscopic sheets of carbon? Simplicity, flexibility, and control. Graphene is a beautiful and incredibly versatile platform for investigating emergent electronic phenomena. Confining electrons to two dimensions enhances their influence on one another, and empowers us to alter their environment with external fields and additional layers. Strategic combinations and arrangements of layered materials can yield new physics and surprising electronic properties. I will discuss how certain combinations lead to superconductivity, magnetism, and topology from materials that have none of these properties on their own, and how this will inform essential questions in quantum materials research.
Cold, flat, and crowded: Why I spend all my time thinking about graphene
Host: Stephen Julian