Qiucheng Li received her B.S. in Chemistry at Shandong University in 2012, and her Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry at Peking University in 2017. During her Ph.D., she developed a series of novel chemical vapor deposition (CVD) growth strategies for two-dimensional materials with high crystalline quality and practical scalability under the guidance of Prof. Zhongfan Liu. She was honored with the chancellor's scholarship, exceptional award for academic innovation at Peking University, and merit student award at Peking University, among others. After graduation, Dr. Li continued to pursue postdoctoral research at Northwestern University, where she investigated the electronic properties and surface chemistry of borophene using ultra-high vacuum scanning probe microscopy with Prof. Mark C. Hersam. She has joined the school of engineering as an assistant professor in 2024.

Dr. Li’s research has been focused on developing synthesis, functionalization, and characterization methods to understand and engineer surfaces and interfaces of emerging 2D quantum materials.

Research interests:

1) Controlled synthesis of new 2D quantum materials and heterostructures;

2) Surface and interface engineering of 2D quantum materials through covalent functionalization and defect engineering;

3) Atomic-scale characterization of 2D quantum materials using ultra-high vacuum scanning tunneling microscopy (UHV-STM).

Her research has been published in Science, Nature Materials, Advanced Materials, Science Advances, ACS Nano, etc. Her publications have been cited over 2000 times, and select publications have been reported by Nature, Nature Chemistry, Nature Materials News & Views articles.

1. Qiucheng Li, Luqing Wang, Hui Li, Maria K. Y. Chan, Mark C. Hersam^*. Synthesis of quantum-confined borophene nanoribbons. ACS Nano 2024, 18 (1), 483–491. (Front Cover article)

2. Xiaolong Liu^#, Qiucheng Li^#, Qiyuan Ruan^#, Matthew S. Rahn, Boris I. Yakobson^*, Mark C. Hersam^*. Borophene synthesis beyond the single-atomic-layer limit. Nat. Mater. 2022, 21, 35-40. (This work has been reported by News&Views articles in Nature Chemistry and Nature Materials)

3. Qiucheng Li, Venkata Surya Chaitanya Kolluru, Matthew S. Rahn, Eric Schwenker, Shaowei Li, Richard G. Hennig, Pierre Darancet, Maria K. Y. Chan, Mark C. Hersam^*. Synthesis of borophane polymorphs through hydrogenation of borophene. Science 2021, 371 (6534), 1143-1148. (Front Cover article; this work has been highlighted in Nature)

4. Qiucheng Li^#, Xiaolong Liu^#, Eden B. Aklile^#, Shaowei Li, Mark C. Hersam^*. Self-assembled borophene/graphene nanoribbon mixed-dimensional heterostructures. Nano Lett. 2021, 21 (9), 4029–4035.

5. Li Lin^#, Jiayu Li^#, Qinghong Yuan^#, Qiucheng Li^#, Jincan Zhang, Luzhao Sun, Dingran Rui, Zhaolong Chen, Kaicheng Jia, Mingzhan Wang, Yanfeng Zhang, Mark H. Rummeli, Ning Kang, H. Q. Xu^*, Feng Ding^*, Hailin Peng^*, Zhongfan Liu^*. Nitrogen-cluster doping for high-mobility/conductivity graphene films with millimetre-sized domains. Sci. Adv. 2019, 5 (8), eaaw8337.

6. Qiucheng Li, Yingze Song, Runzhang Xu, Li Zhang^*, Jing Gao, Zhou Xia, Zhengnan Tian, Nan Wei, Mark H. Rümmeli, Xiaolong Zou, Jingyu Sun^*, Zhongfan Liu^*. Biotemplating growth of nepenthes-like N-doped graphene as a bifunctional polysulfide scavenger for Li–S batteries. ACS Nano 2018, 12 (10), 10240-10250.

7. Xiangguo Wang^#, Qiucheng Li^#, Li Zhang^*, Zhongli Hu, Lianghao Yu, Tao Jiang, Chen Lu, Chenglin Yan, Jingyu Sun^*, Zhongfan Liu. Caging Nb₂O₅ nanowires in PECVD-derived graphene capsules toward bendable sodium-ion hybrid supercapacitors. Adv. Mater. 2018, 30, 1800963.

8. Qiucheng Li, Zifeng Zhao, Baoming Yan, Xiuju Song, Zhepeng Zhang, Jia Li, Xiaosong Wu, Zuqiang Bian, Xiaolong Zou^*, Yanfeng Zhang^*, Zhongfan Liu^*. Nickelocene-precursors-facilitated fast growth of graphene/h-BN vertical heterostructures and its applications in OLEDs. Adv. Mater. 2017, 29, 1701325.