Invariant ionic conductance in an atomically thin polar nanopore
Abstract
Ion channels regulate many essential properties of biological cells, especially the membrane potential. Despite decades of efforts on artificial channels, it remains a great challenge to mimic the dipole potential-an indispensable constituent of the membrane potential, due to its angstrom-scale characteristic length. Here, we explore nanopores in monolayer molybdenum sulfide selenide (MoSSe) considering its intrinsic dipole and atomic thickness. Remarkably, an invariant ionic conductance was observed over salt concentrations spanning six orders of magnitude, distinct from all known conductance-concentration scaling laws and reminiscent of the current saturation in cell membranes at high concentrations. Molecular dynamics simulations revealed the fundamental role of the dipole-modulated dielectric properties of nanoconfined water. Our findings highlight an exotic conductance scaling law and open up a novel avenue for controlling ion transport in unprecedented ways.
Cite
@article{arxiv.2603.21827,
title = {Invariant ionic conductance in an atomically thin polar nanopore},
author = {Shengping Zhang and Haiou Zeng and Ningran Wu and Guodong Xue and Xiao Li and Anshul Saxena and Junhe Tong and Nianjie Liang and Zeyu Zhuang and Jing Yang and Narayana R. Aluru and Kaihui Liu and Bai Song and Luda Wang},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2603.21827},
year = {2026}
}