Automated Scanning Device Detects Monolayers With 99.9% Accuracy

Staring through a microscope at samples of material for hours on end, attempting to locate monolayers, is one of the most laborious and intimidating tasks for undergraduate assistants in university research laboratories. As a result of their unique properties, these two-dimensional materials -- which are less than 1/100,000th the width of a human hair -- are in high demand for use in photonics, electronics, and optoelectronic devices. Research labs hire armies of undergraduates to do nothing but look for monolayers. It's very tedious, and if you get tired, you might miss some of the monolayers or you might start making misidentifications. Jesús Sánchez Juárez, a Ph.D. student in the Cardenas Lab, has made work simpler for undergraduates, their research facilities, and companies that have difficulty identifying monolayers.