Furthermore, removing the ligands by thermal decomposition allows for determination of the net weight of the nanosheets. Heating the nanosheets above 400°C leads to complete decomposition of the ligands on the surface, with the experiment being performed under nitrogen flow to avoid oxidation of the NMLs themselves. TGA curves of different syntheses show different reductions in mass, meaning the different samples have different amounts of ligands on the surface. These results indicate that the surface ligands account for 20%, 18%, 15%, and 17% of the initial mass for WS2-ODT, WS2-HDT, WS2-DDT, and WS2-OAm, respectively (Figure ). The reduction in the number of ligands at the surface of the nanosheets leads to partial instability of the nanosheets. In the case of WS2-OAm, the instability can additionally come from the presence of 2H domains in the nanosheets inducing the multilayer structure.