Low-frequency phonons of few-layer graphene within a tight-binding model

Abstract

Few-layer graphene is a layered carbon material with covalent bonding in the layers and weak van der Waals interactions between the layers. The interlayer energy is more than two orders of magnitude smaller than the intralayer one, which hinders the description of the static and dynamic properties within parameter-free electron band structure models. We overcome this difficulty by introducing two sets of matrix elements - one set for the covalent bonds in the graphene layers and another one for the van der Waals interactions between adjacent graphene layers in a tight-binding model of the band structure. Both sets of matrix elements are derived from an ab-initio study on carbon dimers. The matrix elements are then applied in the calculation of the phonon dispersion of graphite and few-layer graphene with AB and ABC layer stacking. The results for AB stacking agree well with the available experimental data, which justifies the application of the matrix elements to other layered carbon structures with van der Waals interactions such as few-layer graphene nanoribbons, multiwall carbon nanotubes, and carbon onions.

Phys. Rev. B, accepted, 12.12.2014

References in corpus (6)

• The phonon dispersion of graphite by inelastic x-ray scattering
• Phonon dispersions and vibrational properties of monolayer, bilayer, and trilayer graphene
• Observation of out-of-plane vibrations in few-layer graphene
• Layer breathing modes in few-layer graphene
• Excitation Energy Dependent Raman Signatures of ABA- and ABC-stacked Few-layer Graphene
• Raman and Infra-red properties and layer dependence of the phonon dispersions in multi-layered graphene

Cited by in corpus (2)

• Two-phonon Raman bands of bilayer graphene: revisited
• Theoretical evidence of a significant modification of the electronic structure of double-walled carbon nanotubes due to the interlayer interaction