The burgeoning field of anion engineering in oxide-based compounds aims to tune physical properties by incorporating additional anions of different size, electronegativity, and charge. Such heteroanionic oxynitrides and oxyfluorides may display new or enhanced responses not readily predicted from or even absent in the simpler homoanionic (oxide) compounds because of their proximity to the ionocovalent-bonding boundary provided by the anions. In addition, multiple anions allow heteroanionic materials to span a more complex atomic structure design palette and interaction space than the homoanionic oxide analogs. Here, I show how to design rationally new heteroanionic compounds exhibiting electronic metal-insulator transitions (MITs) for highly tunable electronic materials platforms. The ability to manipulate the electronic states is key to realizing new classes of adaptive and low-power microelectronics. The strategy is to control the conducting or insulating state by structural design through control over metal-metal interactions. Our work shows that electronic transitions can be designed by exploiting multiple anions, and heteroanionic materials could offer new insights into the microscopic electron-lattice interactions governing unresolved transitions in homoanionic oxides.

Electronic function by atomic design of heteroanionic materials

2019 Fall National Meeting

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