Probing the interlayer coupling in 2H−NbS2 via soft x-ray angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy

One secret to the charm of two-dimensional (2D) van der Waals materials is that their interlayer coupling lies in a sweet spot: weak enough to render the individual layers electronically quasi-2D, yet strong enough to produce distinct behavior upon stacking individual layers. Here, the authors utilize soft-x-ray angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy to extract the interlayer hopping parameters in the typical transition metal dichalcogenide 2$H$-NbS${}_{2}$. Comparison with first-principles calculations reveals the influence of atomic distances and hybrid functionals on interlayer coupling.