No Arabic abstract
Single-layer graphene sheets are typically characterized by long-wavelength corrugations (ripples) which can be shown to be at the origin of rather strong potentials with both scalar and vector components. We present an extensive microscopic study, based on a self-consistent Kohn-Sham-Dirac density-functional method, of the carrier density distribution in the presence of these ripple-induced external fields. We find that spatial density fluctuations are essentially controlled by the scalar component, especially in nearly-neutral graphene sheets, and that in-plane atomic displacements are as important as out-of-plane ones. The latter fact is at the origin of a complicated spatial distribution of electron-hole puddles which has no evident correlation with the out-of-plane topographic corrugations. In the range of parameters we have explored, exchange and correlation contributions to the Kohn-Sham potential seem to play a minor role.
We study the discrete energy spectrum of curved graphene sheets in the presence of a magnetic field. The shifting of the Landau levels is determined for complex and realistic geometries of curved graphene sheets. The energy levels follow a similar square root dependence on the energy quantum number as for rippled and flat graphene sheets. The Landau levels are shifted towards lower energies proportionally to the average deformation and the effect is larger compared to a simple uni-axially rippled geometry. Furthermore, the resistivity of wrinkled graphene sheets is calculated for different average space curvatures and shown to obey a linear relation. The study is carried out with a quantum lattice Boltzmann method, solving the Dirac equation on curved manifolds.
The ability to control the strength of interaction is essential for studying quantum phenomena emerging from a system of correlated fermions. For example, the isotope effect illustrates the effect of electron-phonon coupling on superconductivity, providing an important experimental support for the BCS theory. In this work, we report a new device geometry where the magic-angle twisted bilayer graphene (tBLG) is placed in close proximity to a Bernal bilayer graphene (BLG) separated by a 3 nm thick barrier. Using charge screening from the Bernal bilayer, the strength of electron-electron Coulomb interaction within the twisted bilayer can be continuously tuned. Transport measurements show that tuning Coulomb screening has opposite effect on the insulating and superconducting states: as Coulomb interaction is weakened by screening, the insulating states become less robust, whereas the stability of superconductivity is enhanced. Out results demonstrate the ability to directly probe the role of Coulomb interaction in magic-angle twisted bilayer graphene. Most importantly, the effect of Coulomb screening points toward electron-phonon coupling as the dominant mechanism for Cooper pair formation, and therefore superconductivity, in magic-angle twisted bilayer graphene.
At low energies, electrons in doped graphene sheets are described by a massless Dirac fermion Hamiltonian. In this work we present a semi-analytical expression for the dynamical density-density linear-response function of noninteracting massless Dirac fermions (the so-called Lindhard function) at finite temperature. This result is crucial to describe finite-temperature screening of interacting massless Dirac fermions within the Random Phase Approximation. In particular, we use it to make quantitative predictions for the specific heat and the compressibility of doped graphene sheets. We find that, at low temperatures, the specific heat has the usual normal-Fermi-liquid linear-in-temperature behavior, with a slope that is solely controlled by the renormalized quasiparticle velocity.
Recent transport experiments have demonstrated that the rhombohedral stacking trilayer graphene is an insulator with an intrinsic gap of 6meV and the Bernal stacking trilayer one is a metal. We propose a Hubbard model with a moderate $U$ for layered graphene sheets, and show that the model well explains the experiments of the stacking dependent energy gap. The on-site Coulomb repulsion drives the metallic phase of the non-interacting system to a weak surface antiferromagnetic insulator for the rhombohedral stacking layers, but does not alter the metallic phase for the Bernal stacking layers.
One of the most exciting phenomena observed in crystalline disordered membranes, including a suspended graphene, is rippling, i.e. a formation of static flexural deformations. Despite an active research, it still remains unclear whether the rippled phase exists in the thermodynamic limit, or it is destroyed by thermal fluctuations. We demonstrate that a sufficiently strong short-range disorder stabilizes ripples, whereas in the case of a weak disorder the thermal flexural fluctuations dominate in the thermodynamic limit. The phase diagram of the disordered suspended graphene contains two separatrices: the crumpling transition line dividing the flat and crumpled phases and the rippling transition line demarking the rippled and clean phases. At the intersection of the separatrices there is the unstable, multicritical point which splits up all four phases. Most remarkably, rippled and clean flat phases are described by a single stable fixed point which belongs to the rippling transition line. Coexistence of two flat phases in the single point is possible due to non-analiticity in corresponding renormalization group equations and reflects non-commutativity of limits of vanishing thermal and rippling fluctuations.