His research interests cover the chemistry and materials science of low-dimensional materials with emphasis on carbon nanostructures, two-dimensional materials, and their heterostructures. His work relates to the controlled preparation of these materials and their applications in electronic, optoelectronics, and electrocatalysis. He has published around 100 high quality SCI papers on these topics with >10,000 citations and an H-index of 45.

Liu's group research interest: Chemistry, materials sciences, and electronics of low-dimensional materials with an emphasis on carbon nanotubes, graphene, and two-dimensional semiconductors. Catalyst engineering for structure and chirality-controlled growth of single-wall carbon nanotubes; Carbon nanotube chirality analysis using optical spectroscopy and electron diffractions; Growth mechanism investigations of carbon nanotubes, graphene, 2D materials; Development of methodologies for hierarchical assembly of these novel materials into complex and functional systems, their property investigations, and applications in energy, electronics, optoelectronics, and sensing.