Growth and Thermo-driven Crystalline Phase Transition of Metastable Monolayer 1T'-WSe₂ Thin Film

Two-dimensional (2D) transition metal dichalcogenides MX₂ (M = Mo, W, X = S, Se, Te) attracts enormous research interests in recent years. Its 2H phase possesses an indirect to direct bandgap transition in 2D limit, and thus shows great application potentials in optoelectronic devices. The 1T' crystalline phase transition can drive the monolayer MX₂ to be a 2D topological insulator. Here we realized the molecular beam epitaxial (MBE) growth of both the 1T' and 2H phase monolayer WSe₂ on bilayer graphene (BLG) substrate. The crystalline structures of these two phases were characterized using scanning tunneling microscopy. The monolayer 1T'-WSe₂ was found to be metastable, and can transform into 2H phase under post-annealing procedure. The phase transition temperature of 1T'-WSe₂ grown on BLG is lower than that of 1T' phase grown on 2H-WSe₂ layers. This thermo-driven crystalline phase transition makes the monolayer WSe₂ to be an ideal platform for the controlling of topological phase transitions in 2D materials family.