Tunable anisotropic behaviors in phosphorene under periodic potentials in arbitrary directions

We investigate theoretically the anisotropic electronic and optical behaviors of a monolayer black phosphorus (phosphorene) modulated by periodic potential superlattices in arbitrary directions. We demonstrate that different strength and orientation of the phosphorene potential superlattice can give rise to distinct energy spectra, i.e. tuning the intrinsic electronic anisotropy. Accordingly, the anisotropic effective mass, and optical absorption modulated by superlattice strength and orientation are addressed systematically. This feature enables tuning capability more than one order of magnitude in the optical absorption spectrum. Our findings should be useful in building phosphorene optical and (opto)electronic devices by applying external potential superlattice.