Towards scalable nano-engineering of graphene

Abstract

By merging bottom-up and top-down strategies we tailor graphene's electronic properties within nanometer accuracy, which opens up the possibility to design optical and plasmonic circuitries at will. In a first step, graphene electronic properties are macroscopically modified exploiting the periodic potential generated by the self assembly of metal cluster superlattices on a graphene/Ir(111) surface. We then demonstrate that individual metal clusters can be selectively removed by a STM tip with perfect reproducibility and that the structures so created are stable even at room temperature. This enables one to nanopattern circuits down to the 2.5 nm only limited by the periodicity of the Moiré-pattern, i.e., by the distance between neighbouring clusters, and different electronic and optical properties should prevail in the covered and uncovered regions. The method can be carried out on micro-meter-sized regions with clusters of different materials permitting to tune the strength of the periodic potential.

References in corpus (11)

• Chaotic Dirac billiard in graphene quantum dots
• Massive Dirac fermions and Hofstadter butterfly in a van der Waals heterostructure
• Bipolar supercurrent in graphene
• Tailoring the atomic structure of graphene nanoribbons by STM lithography
• Single Layer Behavior and Its Breakdown in Twisted Graphene Layers
• Two Dimensional Ir-Cluster Lattices on Moiré of Graphene with Ir(111)
• Dirac Cones and Minigaps for Graphene on Ir(111)
• Etching and Narrowing of Graphene from the Edges
• Fermi velocity engineering in graphene by substrate modification
• Energy gaps in etched graphene nanoribbons
• Transition from tunneling to direct contact in tungsten nanojunctions

Cited by in corpus (8)

• Exciton-photon interactions in semiconductor nanocrystals: {radiative transitions, non-radiative processes,} and environment effects
• Quantum confinement of Dirac quasiparticles in graphene patterned with subnanometer precision
• Mass-profile quantum dots in graphene
• Morphology of Ti on Monolayer Nanocrystalline Graphene and its Unexpectedly Low Hydrogen Adsorption
• Stern-Gerlach splitters for lattice quasispin
• Graphene Layer Morphology as an Indicator of the Metals Alloy Formation at the Interface
• Atomic-Scale Tailoring of Chemisorbed Atomic Oxygen on Epitaxial Graphene for Graphene-Based Electronic Devices
• Controlling the shape of small clusters with and without macroscopic fields