The development of two-dimensional (2D) materials has opened up possibilities for their application in electronics, optoelectronics and photovoltaics, because they can provide devices with smaller size, higher speed and additional functionalities compared with conventional silicon-based devices.

Funded by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (Grant No. 11874193, 11474265), the research group of Associate Professor Zhang Liyuan from the Department of Physics at Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech) collaborated with Professor Qiao Zhenhua of the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), Professor Yang Shengyuan of Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD), Professor Yang Kun of Florida State University (FSU), Professor Patrick A. Lee of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Professor Genda Gu of the Brookhaven National Laboratory, in confirming the prediction of the 3D quantum Hall effect. The research results were recently published in well-known international academic journal Nature.

In 1987, famous physicist and Harvard professor Bertrand Halperin predicted the existence of the three-dimensional quantum Hall effect. After 32 years, Associate Professor Zhang Liyuan from the Department of Physics at Southern University of Science and Technology (SUSTech) collaborated with Professor Qiao Zhenhua of the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), Professor Yang Shengyuan of Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD), Professor Yang Kun of Florida State University (FSU), Professor Patrick A. Lee of Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and Professor Genda Gu of the Brookhaven National Laboratory, in confirming the prediction of the 3D quantum Hall effect. The research results were recently published in well-known international academic journal Nature.

Recently, Associate Professor Zhang Liyuan from the Department of Physics at Southern University of Science and Technology worked with Professor Qiao Zhenhua of the University of Science and Technology of China (USTC), and Associate Professor Shengyuan Yang of Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD).

“Three-dimensional quantum Hall effect and metal-insulator transition in ZrTe5”,published on Nature on May, 2019, validates the prediction on Quantum Hall effect in 3D election gas proposed by Bertrand Halperin, a Harvard theoretical physicist in 1987. The research was led by prof. Liyuan ZHANG, department of physics.

The Majorana zero mode in the semiconductor-superconductor nanowire is one of the promising candidates for topological quantum computing.