Two-dimensional transition metal tellurides (2D-TMTs) offer a uniquely rich playground for correlated quantum matter. Compared with their lighter chalcogenides homologues, the diffuse character of Te 5p orbitals promotes stronger interlayer coupling, enhanced metal-to-chalcogen charge transfer and intermediate-to-strong spin-orbit interaction, stabilizing a wealth of metastable polymorphs with relative low energies. This energy landscape enables phase engineering, by tuning the growth parameters, different polymorphs can be selectively stabilized at the monolayer regime, each hosting distinct correlated ground states. In the last years, we examine how molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) on decoupling substrates, combined with surface science techniques (STM/STS, nc-AFM, ARPES, XMCD) and first-principles calculations, has uncovered charge density waves, excitonic insulator signatures, topological phases, and emergent magnetism across the telluride family (M = Mo, W, Nb, Ta, Ir, Pt, Mn).

Epitaxial growth of graphene on substrates has been investigated from both a fundamental point of view and technological applications, as has been demonstrated to be scalable to large-area production. This investigations shows how the interaction between the graphene layers and the metallic substrates can lead to the emergence of new and exotic effects. During my doctoral studies, I explored graphene grown on metal substrates, enhancing its properties by addinng new functionalities by self-assembly of molecular systems. Recently, we demonstrated that Te intercalation in Gr/Ir(111) provides a promising platform for tailoring spin-orbit coupling properties, including the possibility of opening a bandgap and realize spin-dependent transport phenomena, such as the quantum spin Hall effect.