Ab initio Study of Graphene on SiC

Abstract

Employing density-functional calculations we study single and double graphene layers on Si- and C-terminated 1x1-6H-SiC surfaces. We show that, in contrast to earlier assumptions, the first carbon layer is covalently bonded to the substrate, and cannot be responsible for the graphene-type electronic spectrum observed experimentally. The characteristic spectrum of free-standing graphene appears with the second carbon layer, which exhibits a weak van der Waals bonding to the underlying structure. For Si-terminated substrate, the interface is metallic, whereas on C-face it is semiconducting or semimetallic for single or double graphene coverage, respectively.

4 pages, 3 figures, 1 table; Submitted to Physical Review Letters on 01/08/07

References in corpus (4)

• Landau Level Splitting in Graphene in High Magnetic Fields
• Highly-ordered graphene for two dimensional electronics
• Electron states of mono- and bilayer graphene on SiC probed by STM
• The structural properties of the multi-layer graphene/4H-SiC(000-1) system as determined by Surface X-ray Diffraction

Cited by in corpus (12)

• The electronic properties of graphene
• Valley Dependent Optoelectronics from Inversion Symmetry Breaking
• Raman spectroscopy of epitaxial graphene on a SiC substrate
• Origins of anomalous electronic structures of epitaxial graphene on silicon carbide
• Tuning the gap in bilyaer graphene using chemical functionalization: DFT calculations
• Symmetry Breaking in Few Layer Graphene Films
• Morphology of graphene thin film growth on SiC(0001)
• The interface structure of epitaxial graphene grown on 4H-SiC(0001)
• First-Principles Study of Electron Linewidths in Graphene
• Departure from the conical dispersion in epitaxial graphene
• Electronic structure of epitaxial graphene nanoribbons on SiC(0001)
• Raman spectroscopy and imaging of graphene