Synthesis of graphene ribbons using selective chemical vapor deposition

A new method for implementing graphene ribbons using selective graphene growth on metal-sidewall by chemical vapor deposition has been proposed. In this method, Ni catalyst is pre-patterned before chemical vapor deposition, and graphene film is selectively grown on the sidewall of the nickel for graphene ribbons. The graphene ribbons were confirmed by TEM image and Raman spectroscopy, and the fabricated graphene ribbon transistors showed well gate-modulated output characteristics. We believe this sidewall-graphene could be useful for applications such as graphene sensors which require high surface area of graphene.     

基于graphene条带的硅纳米结构

采用分子动力学模拟方法研究了graphene条带上生长硅纳米结构的过程,分析了不同温度下硅原子在graphene条带边沿生成的新型纳米结构.研究表明,随机分布的硅原子吸附到锯齿型graphene条带边沿在不同的温度T下可生成不同类型的硅纳米结构：300K≤T<2000K时形成无规则的团簇,2000K≤T≤2800K时形成单原子链结构,2800K<T<3900K时形成含缺陷的硅链结构,T≥3900K时硅原子逐渐替代条带边沿的碳原子直至graphene条带破坏.而硅原子吸附到扶手椅型graphene条带边沿在300K≤T<3000 K内仅能形成非链状的不定型的硅纳米结构. 关键词： graphene 硅 纳米结构 分子动力学模拟     

Acoustic analog of monolayer graphene and edge states

Acoustic analog of monolayer graphene has been designed by using silicone rubber spheres of honeycomb lattices embedded in water. The dispersion of the structure has been studied theoretically using the rigorous multiple-scattering method. The energy spectra with the Dirac point have been verified and zigzag edge states have been found in ribbons of the structure, which are analogous to the electronic ones in graphene nanoribbons. The guided modes along the zigzag edge excited by a point source have been numerically demonstrated. The open cavity and “Z” type edge waveguide with 60° corners have also been realized by using such edge states.     

A review on silicene — New candidate for electronics

Silicene-the silicon-based counterpart of graphene-has a two dimensional structure that is responsible for the variety of potentially useful chemical and physical properties. The existence of silicene has been achieved recently owing to experiments involving epitaxial growth of silicon as stripes on Ag(001), ribbons on Ag(110), and sheets on Ag(111). The nano-ribbons observed on Ag(110) were found-by both high definition experimental scanning tunneling microscopy images and density functional theory calculations-to consist of an arched honeycomb structure. Angle resolved photo-emission experiments on these silicene nano-ribbons on Ag(110), along the direction of the ribbons, showed a band structure which is analogous to the Dirac cones of graphene. Unlike silicon surfaces, which are highly reactive to oxygen, the silicene nano-ribbons were found to be resistant to oxygen reactivity.On the theoretical side, recent extensive efforts have been deployed to understand the properties of standalone silicene sheets and nano-ribbons using both tight-binding and density functional theory calculations. Unlike graphene it is demonstrated that silicene sheets are stable only if a small buckling (0.44 Å) is present. The electronic properties of silicene nano-ribbons and silicene sheets were found to resemble those of graphene.Although this is a fairly new avenue, the already obtained outcome from these important first steps in understanding silicene showed promising features that could give a new future to silicon in the electronics industry, thus opening a promising route toward wide-range applications. In this review, we plan to introduce silicene by presenting the available experimental and theoretical studies performed to date, and suggest future directions to be explored to make the synthesis of silicene a viable one.     

Electrically tunable polarizer based on anisotropic absorption of graphene ribbons

We theoretically demonstrate that an electrically tunable polarizer can be obtained using a periodic array of graphene ribbons supported on a dielectric film on top of a thick piece of metal. The polarizing mechanism originates from anisotropic absorption of the graphene ribbons. The results of fullwave numerical simulations reveal that absorption of 0.0075 for one polarization and 0.9986 for another polarization can be obtained at normal incidence in the THz range. For circular incidence polarization, the corresponding polarizing extinction ratio increases to 65 dB.     

Tunable graphene-based mid-infrared band-pass planar filter and its application

We have designed and proposed the edge modes supported by graphene ribbons and the planar band-pass filter consisting of graphene ribbons coupled to a graphene ring resonator by using the finite-difference time-domain numerical method.Simulation results show that the edge modes improve the electromagnetic coupling between devices. This structure works as a novel, tunable mid-infrared band-pass filter. Our studies will benefit the fabrication of planar, ultra-compact nano-scale devices in the mid-infrared region. A power splitter consisting of two output ribbons that is useful in photonic integrated devices and circuits is also designed and simulated. These devices are useful for designing ultra-compact planar devices in photonic integrated circuits.     

Controlling the polarization fluctuation of excitons in armchair graphene ribbons by a laser field

We investigate the effect of the laser field on the polarization fluctuation of excitons in graphene ribbons. In order to calculate the fluctuation, we develop a bosonization method to deal with the electron-hole system. Our results show that the polarization fluctuation may be controlled by adjusting the strength and frequency of the laser field. The insulating armchair graphene ribbons may be divided into two types according to the width-dependences of the excitonic polarization fluctuation.     

Structural stability and electronic properties of Ni-doped armchair graphene nanoribbons

The size dependent electronic properties of armchair graphene nanoribbons (AGNR) with Ni doped atoms have been investigated using spin-unrestricted density functional theory. We predict antiferromagnetic (AFM) ground states for Ni-termination and one edge Ni-doping. The computed formation energy reveals that one edge Ni-terminated AGNR are energetically more favourable as compared to pristine ribbons. One edge substitutional doping is energetically more favourable as compared to centre doping by ∼1 eV whereas both edge doping is unfavourable. The bond length of substitutional Ni atoms is shorter than that of Ni adsorption in GNR, implying a stronger binding for substitutional Ni atoms. It is evident that binding energy is also affected by the coordination number of the foreign atom. The results show that Ni-interaction perturbs the electronic structure of the ribbons significantly, causing enhanced metallicity for all configurations irrespective of doping site. The band structures reveal the separation of spin up and down electronic states indicating towards the existence of spin polarized current in Ni-terminated and one edge doped ribbons. Our calculation predicts that AGNR containing Ni impurities can play an important role for the fabrication of spin filters and spintronic devices.     

Energy band-gap engineering of graphene nanoribbons

We investigate electronic transport in lithographically patterned graphene ribbon structures where the lateral confinement of charge carriers creates an energy gap near the charge neutrality point. Individual graphene layers are contacted with metal electrodes and patterned into ribbons of varying widths and different crystallographic orientations. The temperature dependent conductance measurements show larger energy gaps opening for narrower ribbons. The sizes of these energy gaps are investigated by measuring the conductance in the nonlinear response regime at low temperatures. We find that the energy gap scales inversely with the ribbon width, thus demonstrating the ability to engineer the band gap of graphene nanostructures by lithographic processes.     

Interaction of terahertz electromagnetic waves with periodic gratings of graphene micro- and nanoribbons

An original mathematical model of the interaction of terahertz (THz) electromagnetic waves with periodic gratings of graphene micro- and nanoribbons is based on the solution to the boundary-value problem of diffraction for the Maxwell equations with electrodynamic boundary conditions and material equations. The electrodynamic calculations of the transmission coefficients of the TEM wave versus frequency are performed for the 2D grating of graphene micro- and nanoribbons at several chemical potentials, grating periods, and geometrical sizes of ribbons. The results of the calculations show that the transmission spectrum exhibits a minimum in the THz range if the electric field of the wave is perpendicular to the graphene ribbons. The minimum is due to the plasmon resonance of the fundamental mode in graphene, and the absorption peaks at higher frequencies in the upper part of the THz range are related to the highorder plasmon modes.     

First principles calculations of armchair graphene nanoribbons interacting with Cu atoms

We have investigated the electronic properties of bare, H-terminated, Cu-terminated and Cu-doped armchair graphene nanoribbons (AGNRs) using ab-initio approach. We found that H-termination enhances the stability and band gap whereas H extraction introduces dangling bands and lowers the band gap making bare ribbons indirect band gap semiconductors. The calculations revealed that strong hybridization between Cu atoms and AGNRs, lessen the band gap for Cu-terminated ribbons and gives rise to metallicity in Cu-doped AGNRs irrespective of their widths. Formation energy of considered ribbons yield that H-terminated AGNRs with lowest formation energy are most energetically favored, next are one edge Cu-terminated ribbons followed by bare ones whereas both edges Cu-doped ribbons are least energetically plausible. We predict that presence of Cu atoms in GNRs, significantly alter the band gap and can be used in band gap engineering of nanoribbons.     

Effect of oxidation of graphene nanoribbons on electronic and magnetic properties

The electronic properties, band gap and ionization potential as well as the energies of the singlet and triplet states of zigzag and armchair graphene nanoribbons are calculated as a function of the number of oxygen atoms on the ribbon employing density functional theory at B3LYP/6-31G* level. The calculated band gaps indicate that both structures are semiconducting. The band gap of the armchair ribbons initially decreases followed by an increase with oxygen number. For zigzag ribbons the band gap decreases with increasing oxygen number whereas the ionization potential increases with oxygen content. In both armchair and zigzag ribbons the ionization potential shows a gradual increase with the number of oxygen atoms. Some of the oxygenated ribbons calculated have triplet ground states and have the density of states at the Fermi level for spin down greater than spin up suggesting the possibility they may be ferromagnetic semiconductors.     

Electron-electron and spin-orbit interactions in armchair graphene ribbons

The effects of intrinsic spin-orbit and Coulomb interactions on low-energy properties of finite width graphene armchair ribbons are studied by means of a Dirac Hamiltonian. It is shown that metallic states subsist in the presence of intrinsic spin-orbit interactions as spin-filtered edge states, in contrast with the insulating behavior predicted for graphene planes. A charge-gap opens due to Coulomb interactions in neutral ribbons, that vanishes as Delta approximately 1/W, with a gapless spin sector. Weak intrinsic spin-orbit interactions do not change the insulating behavior. Explicit expressions for the width-dependent gap and various correlation functions are presented.     

Optical strong coupling in hybrid metal-graphene metamaterial for terahertz sensing

We propose a terahertz hybrid metamaterial composed of subwavelength metallic slits and graphene plasmonic ribbons for sensing application. This special design can cause the interaction between the plasmon resonances of the metallic slits and graphene ribbons, giving rise to a strong coupling effect and Rabi splitting. Intricate balancing in the strong coupling region can be perturbed by the carrier concentration of graphene, which is subject to the analyte on its surface. Thereby, the detection of analyte can be reflected as a frequency shift of resonance in terahertz transmission spectra. The result shows that this sensor can achieve a theoretical detection limit of 325 electrons or holes per square micrometer. Meanwhile, it also works well as a refractive index sensor with the frequency sensitivity of 485 GHz/RIU. Our results may contribute to design of ultra-micro terahertz sensors.     

高定向热解石墨表面局域导电增强现象的扫描探针显微学研究

基于导电型原子力显微镜和扫描隧道显微镜的对比观察,研究高定向热解石墨表面上残留石墨片的导电增强现象.根据样品电阻的测量数据,将这种现象归结为导电针尖与石墨表面的点接触问题,并且发现接触电导和接触点处局域的电子密度成正比,从而确定石墨表面的局域导电增强现象的原因在于残留在石墨表面的石墨片具有较高的电子密度. 关键词： 扫描隧道显微镜 导电原子力显微镜 高定向热解石墨 导电性     

Asymmetrical plasmon reflections in tapered graphene ribbons with wrinkle edges

Asymmetrical graphene plasmon reflection patterns are found in infrared near-field images of tapered graphene ribbons epitaxially grown on silicon carbon substrates. Comparing experimental data with numerical simulations, the asymmetry of these patterns is attributed to reflection of plasmons by wrinkled edges naturally grown in the graphene. These graphene wrinkles are additional plasmon reflectors with varying optical conductivity, which act as nanometer scale plasmonic modulators and thus have potential applications in photoelectric information detectors, transmitters, and modulators.     

Chirality effect in disordered graphene ribbon junctions

We investigate the influence of edge chirality on the electronic transport in clean or disordered graphene ribbon junctions. By using the tight-binding model and the Landauer-Büttiker formalism, the junction conductance is obtained. In the clean sample, the zero-magnetic-field junction conductance is strongly chirality-dependent in both unipolar and bipolar ribbons, whereas the high-magnetic-field conductance is either chirality-independent in the unipolar or chirality-dependent in the bipolar ribbon. Furthermore, we study the disordered sample in the presence of magnetic field and find that the junction conductance is always chirality-insensitive for both unipolar and bipolar ribbons with adequate disorders. In addition, the disorder-induced conductance plateaus can exist in all chiral bipolar ribbons provided the disorder strength is moderate. These results suggest that we can neglect the effect of edge chirality in fabricating electronic devices based on the magnetotransport in a disordered graphene ribbon.     

Ballistic transport in bilayer nano-graphite ribbons under gate and magnetic fields

This study uses the tight-binding model to examine the ballistic transport of short and infinitely long bilayer nano-graphite ribbons for different stacked structures, AA and AB, under perpendicularly applied gate and magnetic fields. In the small bias region, the conduction of the AB-stacked ribbon is better than for the AA. Under a gate field with small bias, the AB-stacked ribbon exhibits a significant current peak at the zero gate field point, similar to the graphene ribbon. On the contrary, this current peak is not found in the AA-stacked case. Under a perpendicular magnetic field with small bias, the magnetoresistance ratio in both stacked graphene ribbons are proportional to the square of the magnetic field.     

Structure, stability, edge states, and aromaticity of graphene ribbons

We determine the stability, the geometry, the electronic, and magnetic structure of hydrogen-terminated graphene-nanoribbon edges as a function of the hydrogen content of the environment by means of density functional theory. Antiferromagnetic zigzag ribbons are stable only at extremely low ultravacuum pressures. Under more standard conditions, the most stable structures are the mono- and dihydrogenated armchair edges and a zigzag edge reconstruction with one di- and two monohydrogenated sites. At high hydrogen concentration "bulk" graphene is not stable and spontaneously breaks to form ribbons, in analogy to the spontaneous breaking of graphene into small-width nanoribbons observed experimentally in solution. The stability and the existence of exotic edge electronic states and/or magnetism is rationalized in terms of simple concepts from organic chemistry (Clar's rule).