Phosphorene
![Bulk black phosphorus consists of multiple phosphorene sheets](/Images/godic/202502/02/Bulk_black_phosphorus0430.png")
![Phosphorene structure: (a) tilted view, (b) side view, (c) top view. Red (blue) balls represent phosphorus atoms in the lower (upper) layer.[15]](/Images/godic/202502/02/Phosphorene_structure0430.png")
![Atomic force microscopy images of few-layer phosphorene sheets produced by ultrasonic exfoliation of black phosphorus in N-methyl-2-pyrrolidone and spin-coated onto a SiO2/Si substrate.[17]](/Images/godic/202502/02/Phosphorene_AFM0430.jpg")
![Atomic force microscopy (AFM) 3D image of few-layer phosphorene sample continuously taken for 7 days. Phosphorene reacts with oxygen and water to develop liquid phase bubbles.[20]](/Images/godic/202502/02/Degradation0430.gif")
Phosphorene is a two-dimensional single-layer material consisting of a phosphorus allotrope – black phosphorus. It is a natural semiconductor where electron flow can be switched “on” and “off” due to a non-zero fundamental band gap. Its two-dimensional structure makes it conceptually similar to the carbon-based graphene, hence the name phosphorene. Phosphorene is predicted to be a strong competitor to graphene because of phosphorene’s semiconducting properties absent in graphene, and with silicene (also a semiconductor) as silicene tends to self-destruct upon peeling layers of it off while phosphorene does not. Phosphorene was first isolated in 2014 by mechanical exfoliation.