As

we expect, the fluorinated BN nanosheets display a typical semiconductor characteristic of the I V curve (green), and its current value varies from −15.854 to 13.663 μA. While the precursor bulk BN shows its intrinsic electric insulation characteristic with no detectable current under the same bias voltage (black). The current value of the h-BNNSs without fluorination ranges from −300 to 300 nA (red, as shown by a magnified inset), which may owe to the indirect to direct bandgap transition [30]. The fluorinated h-BNNSs possessing an excellent electrical conductivity suggest that the BN material is click here transformed from the insulator to a semiconductor through the effective doping of F, which will extend their applications in nanoelectronics. Figure 3 Schema of electrical measurement, I – V characteristic curves, XPS spectra, and TEM images. MK-4827 concentration (a) Schematic illustration of the electrical measurement setup based on the STM-TEM holder. (b) Current–voltage (I-V) characteristic curves of bulk BN (I), the exfoliated (II), and fluorinated (III) BNNS, respectively; an inset showing the amplified view of the I-V curves (I and II). (c) XPS spectra of the Selleck GDC-941 exfoliated (I) and fluorinated

(II) BNNS, respectively, an inset showing F 1s region. (d) TEM images of bulk BN (I), the exfoliated (II) and fluorinated (III) BNNS connected between the Pt cantilever and Au tip, respectively. In order to further identify doping F into the h-BNNSs, we analyzed

the chemical composition of the products by XPS (Figure 3c) and EDS (Figure S5 in Additional file 1). Figure 3c shows the XPS spectra of the exfoliated (I) and further fluorinated (II) products, respectively. The results reveal that B, C, N, O and F elements exist in the fluorinated products, in which the binding energy of B 1s, C 1s, N 1s, O 1s, and F 1s is corresponding to 197.6, 288.4, 401.7, 530.0, and 686.6 eV, respectively. The existence of C and O elements commonly seen could attribute to the carbon contamination and water adsorbing from the atmosphere. Comparatively, the curve I only show an existence of the B, C, N and O elements. It suggests the F element appearing in the fluorinated products is the key factor contributing to the excellent electrical conductivity of the h-BNNSs. If the F only attaches to the surface Hydroxychloroquine nmr of BNNSs, it will be too unstable to exist under the beam irradiation in the electron microscope [23, 24], resulting in electrical conductivity that will not be significantly improved. So, we deduce that the excellent electrical conductivity of the fluorinated BN nanosheets alternatively confirms the F was doped into the few-layered h-BNNSs successfully. Conclusions In summary, an excellent electrical conductivity of the exfoliated and fluorinated h-BNNSs, i.e., transferring from the insulator to the semiconductor, has been reported.