High-entropy materials shift the traditional materials discovery paradigm to one that leverages disorder, enabling access to unique chemistries unreachable through enthalpy alone. A MRSEC team at Penn State University has developed a high-throughput framework for discovering and understanding the single-phase formation of high-entropy oxides by integrating computation and experiment in a self-consistent feedback loop. To more rapidly explore rock salt composition space, the team utilizes CHGNet machine-learning interatomic potentials with impressive accuracy even in disordered systems.

AC electric double layer gating (EDL) periodically applies large electric fields to two-dimensional gallium to enable the detection of a permanent dipole moment in the 2D layer, using microreflectivity. This validates predictions that 2D metals will have a dipole resulting from non-centrosymmetric bonding.

Intercalation of air-stable monolayer Pb into EG/SiC by confinement heteroepitaxy (CHet) enables study of heavy metal films at the extreme limit of thinness with complementary microscopy and spectroscopy. Pb coverages up to 90% can be achieved at elevated temperatures beyond those of conventional ultrahigh vacuum methods.