A Route to Atomically Precise Hexagonal Boron Nitride Nanopores

In this presentation, we discuss the fabrication of individual nanopores in hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) with atomically precise control of the pore shape and size using only a conventional TEM. By careful tuning of the beam conditions, we show that individual perfect triangular pores are fabricated in h-BN and their size can be controlled with near-atomic precision. While much progress has been made, most previous methods of pore production in other 2D materials still typically create pores with irregular geometry and imprecise diameters. In contrast, other studies have shown that with careful control of electron irradiation, defects in h-BN grow with pristine zig-zag edges at quantized triangular sizes, but they have never before demonstrated production and control of isolated defects. In this work, we combine these techniques to yield a method in which we can create and control individual size-quantized triangular nanopores through multilayer h-BN sheets.