Self-powered semitransparent WS₂/LaVO₃vertical-heterostructure photodetectors by employing interfacial hexagonal boron nitride

Two-dimensional (2D) semiconductor and LaVO₃materials with high absorption coefficients in the visible light region are attractive structures for high-performance photodetector (PD) applications. Insulating 2D hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) with a large band gap and excellent transmittance is a very attractive material as an interface between 2D/semiconductor heterostructures. We first introduce WS₂/h-BN/LaVO₃semitransparent PD. The photo-current/dark current ratio of the device exhibits a delta-function characteristic of 4 × 10⁵at 0 V, meaning 'self-powered'. The WS₂/h-BN/LaVO₃PD shows up to 0.27 A W^-1responsivity (R) and 4.6 × 10¹⁰cm Hz^1/2W^-1detectivity (D*) at 730 nm. Especially, it was confirmed that theD* performance improved by about 5 times compared to the WS₂/LaVO₃device at zero bias. Additionally, it is suggested that the PD maintains 87% of its initialRfor 2000 h under the atmosphere with a temperature of 25 °C and humidity of 30%. Based on the above results, we suggest that the WS₂/h-BN/LaVO₃heterojunction is promising as a self-powered optoelectronic device.