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Materials Science
Japan
2026

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Best Scientists

D-Index
229
Citations
238794
World Ranking
98
National Ranking
3

Materials Science

D-Index
216
Citations
211377
World Ranking
17
National Ranking
2

Research.com Recognitions

  • 2026 - Research.com Materials Science in Japan Leader Award
  • 2025 - Research.com Best Scientists Award
  • 2025 - Research.com Materials Science in Japan Leader Award
  • 2023 - Research.com Materials Science in Japan Leader Award
  • 2023 - Research.com Physics in Japan Leader Award
  • 2022 - Research.com Materials Science in Japan Leader Award
  • 2022 - Research.com Physics in Japan Leader Award

Overview

Kenji Watanabe is affiliated with the National Institute for Materials Science in Japan. Their research spans several key fields, including Materials Science, Physics and Astronomy, and Engineering. Within these areas, their work notably focuses on subfields such as Materials Chemistry, Atomic and Molecular Physics and Optics, Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Biomedical Engineering, and Condensed Matter Physics.

The main topics covered by their research include:

  • Graphene research and applications
  • 2D Materials and Applications
  • Quantum and electron transport phenomena
  • Topological Materials and Phenomena
  • Perovskite Materials and Applications
  • MXene and MAX Phase Materials
  • Diamond and Carbon-based Materials Research

Watanabe has contributed to numerous publications. They have published extensively in several frequent venues, including:

  • Nano Letters
  • Nature Communications
  • Nature
  • Physical Review Letters
  • Nature Physics

Recent papers authored by or involving Watanabe cover topics primarily related to two-dimensional materials, quantum phenomena, and superconductivity. Some of the notable publications include:

  • Correlated electronic phases in twisted bilayer transition metal dichalcogenides (2020, Nature Materials)
  • Simulation of Hubbard model physics in WSe2/WS2 moiré superlattices (2020, Nature)
  • Tunable strongly coupled superconductivity in magic-angle twisted trilayer graphene (2021, Nature)
  • Correlated states in twisted double bilayer graphene (2020, Nature Physics)
  • Signatures of fractional quantum anomalous Hall states in twisted MoTe2 (2023, Nature)

Throughout their career, Kenji Watanabe has collaborated frequently with other researchers. Their prominent coauthors include:

  • Takashi Taniguchi
  • James Hone
  • Sefaattin Tongay
  • Feng Wang
  • Pablo Jarillo-Herrero

Best Publications

  • Unconventional superconductivity in magic-angle graphene superlattices

    Yuan Cao;Valla Fatemi;Shiang Fang;Kenji Watanabe

  • Boron nitride substrates for high-quality graphene electronics

    C. R. Dean;A. F. Young;I. Meric;C. Lee

  • Correlated Insulator Behaviour at Half-Filling in Magic Angle Graphene Superlattices

    Yuan Cao;Valla Fatemi;Ahmet Demir;Shiang Fang

  • Direct-bandgap properties and evidence for ultraviolet lasing of hexagonal boron nitride single crystal.

    Kenji Watanabe;Takashi Taniguchi;Hisao Kanda

  • One-dimensional electrical contact to a two-dimensional material.

    L. Wang;I. Meric;P. Y. Huang;Q. Gao

  • Hofstadter’s butterfly and the fractal quantum Hall effect in moiré superlattices

    C. R. Dean;L. Wang;P. Maher;C. Forsythe

  • Massive Dirac Fermions and Hofstadter Butterfly in a van der Waals Heterostructure

    B. Hunt;J. D. Sanchez-Yamagishi;A. F. Young;M. Yankowitz

  • Micrometer-Scale Ballistic Transport in Encapsulated Graphene at Room Temperature

    Alexander S. Mayorov;Roman V. Gorbachev;Sergey V. Morozov;Liam Britnell

  • Light-emitting diodes by band-structure engineering in van der Waals heterostructures

    Freddie Withers;O {Del Pozo-Zamudio};A. Mishchenko;A. P. Rooney

  • Electrically tunable excitonic light-emitting diodes based on monolayer WSe2 p-n junctions.

    Jason S. Ross;Philip Klement;Aaron M. Jones;Nirmal J. Ghimire

  • Superconductors, orbital magnets and correlated states in magic-angle bilayer graphene

    Xiaobo Lu;Petr Stepanov;Wei Yang;Ming Xie

  • Light-emitting diodes by bandstructure engineering in van der Waals heterostructures

    F. Withers;O. Del Pozo-Zamudio;A. Mishchenko;A. P. Rooney

  • Scanning tunnelling microscopy and spectroscopy of ultra-flat graphene on hexagonal boron nitride

    Jiamin Xue;Javier Sanchez-Yamagishi;Daniel S. Bulmash;Philippe Jacquod

  • Tuning superconductivity in twisted bilayer graphene

    Matthew Yankowitz;Shaowen Chen;Hryhoriy Polshyn;K. Watanabe

  • Multi-terminal transport measurements of MoS2 using a van der Waals heterostructure device platform.

    Xu Cui;Gwan-Hyoung Lee;Young Duck Kim;Ghidewon Arefe

  • Deep Ultraviolet Light-Emitting Hexagonal Boron Nitride Synthesized at Atmospheric Pressure

    Yoichi Kubota;Kenji Watanabe;Osamu Tsuda;Takashi Taniguchi

  • STM Spectroscopy of ultra-flat graphene on hexagonal boron nitride

    Jiamin Xue;Javier Sanchez-Yamagishi;Danny Bulmash;Philippe Jacquod

  • Tunable Phonon Polaritons in Atomically Thin van der Waals Crystals of Boron Nitride

    S. Dai;Z. Fei;Q. Ma;A. S. Rodin

  • Evidence for moiré excitons in van der Waals heterostructures

    Kha Tran;Galan Moody;Fengcheng Wu;Xiaobo Lu

  • Emergence of superlattice Dirac points in graphene on hexagonal boron nitride

    Matthew Yankowitz;Jiamin Xue;Daniel Cormode;Javier D. Sanchez-Yamagishi

  • Giant tunneling magnetoresistance in spin-filter van der Waals heterostructures.

    Tiancheng Song;Xinghan Cai;Matisse Wei-Yuan Tu;Xiaoou Zhang

  • Flexible and Transparent MoS2 Field-Effect Transistors on Hexagonal Boron Nitride-Graphene Heterostructures

    Gwan Hyoung Lee;Young Jun Yu;Young Jun Yu;Xu Cui;Nicholas Petrone

  • Tuning superconductivity in twisted bilayer graphene.

    Matthew Yankowitz;Shaowen Chen;Hryhoriy Polshyn;Yuxuan Zhang

  • Emergent ferromagnetism near three-quarters filling in twisted bilayer graphene

    Aaron L. Sharpe;Aaron L. Sharpe;Eli J. Fox;Eli J. Fox;Arthur W. Barnard;Joe Finney

Frequent Co-Authors

Takashi Taniguchi
Takashi Taniguchi National Institute for Materials Science
Philip Kim
Philip Kim Harvard University
James Hone
James Hone Columbia University
Cory Dean
Cory Dean Columbia University
Feng Wang
Feng Wang University of California, Berkeley
Christoph Stampfer
Christoph Stampfer RWTH Aachen University
Alex Zettl
Alex Zettl University of California, Berkeley
Michael F. Crommie
Michael F. Crommie University of California, Berkeley
Chun Ning Lau
Chun Ning Lau The Ohio State University

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