2D Monolayers for Superior Transparent Electromagnetic Interference Shielding

With countless modern technologies utilizing wireless communication, materials that can selectively allow transmission of visible light and prevent transmission of low frequency GHz electromagnetic interference (EMI) are needed. Recently, 2D materials such as graphene, transition metal dichalcogenides, and MXenes have shown promise for such applications. Despite the rapid advances, little progress has been made in identifying 2D monolayers with intrinsically higher visible transmittance (T_vis) and shielding effectiveness (SE). With endless variations in structure and composition, the 2D materials space is too large for systematic experimental investigation. To tackle this challenge, we perform a high-throughput computational screening. Using an atomistic first-principles method, we simultaneously calculate T_vis and SE of 7000 2D monolayer materials. We identify 26 monolayer materials with excellent properties of >98% T_vis and >5 dB SE (∼70% EMI attenuation). The top candidate, an AgSe₂ monolayer with predicted 98.53% T_vis and 12.53 dB SE (∼94% EMI attenuation), is a significant improvement over the state-of-the-art, graphene, with 96.7% T_vis and 3.04 dB SE (∼40% EMI attenuation). Additionally, we gain physical insights into the transparent EMI shielding performance of 2D monolayers and their electronic structure, elucidating the role of surface terminations and nearly free electron states.