Characterization of Electronic Stress-Induced Changes in Multilayer MoS₂

Transition metal dichalcogenides like molybdenum disulfide (MoS₂) are compelling for next-generation electronic devices. In this work, we investigate the impact of electronic stress on MoS₂ to illustrate that observational and phenomenological information on multiple devices can be useful to describe changes in the device, and caution against the rationalization of paltry results as representative or correlative to device behavior. Here, we stress MoS₂ by applying a sustained 20 V DC bias to study the material's response. Post-stress electronic characterization revealed nonuniform shifts in current-voltage (I-V) behavior alongside microscale changes. Complementary mechanical, spectroscopic, and scanning microwave impedance measurements showed that stress-induced features locally modulate stiffness, surface potential, Raman intensity, and charge carrier density. We correlated I-V behavior with morphological features (wrinkles, tears, folds, height) and device-level geometry (MoS₂ overlap with electrodes, channel area, contact length) on 50 test structures across five chips to move beyond anecdotal conclusions. We found no universal correlations before DC stress. However, device-level geometry was correlated with I-V behavior after DC stress, suggesting that electrode contacts play a more dominant role than morphology in determining performance. Delamination and thinning induced by DC stress led to localized reductions in charge carrier density within the affected regions. Further, delamination and thinning appear to map to I-V device performance in a few samples, but the correlation is lost when a larger sample size is considered. This suggests significant sample-to-sample variability in surface electronic states of the test structures. We also discuss how environmental factors introduced during fabrication may contribute to the observed heterogeneous device response. Progress will require high-resolution, multimodal analysis across many samples constructed under controlled, clean conditions. By building data sets that capture variability, we can better identify the true drivers of performance.