No Arabic abstract
We report the preparation of novel one-dimensional (1D) C60 nanostructures on rippled graphene. Through careful control of the subtle balance between the linear periodic potential of rippled graphene and the C60 surface mobility, we demonstrate that C60 molecules can be arranged into a 1D C60 chain structure with widths of two to three molecules. At a higher annealing temperature, the 1D chain structure transitions to a more compact hexagonal close packed quasi-1D stripe structure. This first experimental realization of 1D C60 structures on graphene may pave a way for fabricating new C60/graphene hybrid structures for future applications in electronics, spintronics and quantum information.
The exceptionally high mobility of carriers in graphene is one of its defining characteristics, especially in view of potential applications. Therefore it is of both practical and fundamental importance to understand the mechanisms responsible for limiting the values of mobility. The aim of the paper is to study theoretically one such mechanism, i.e. scattering on ripples. The transport properties of rippled graphene are studied using using single-band tight-binding model. Both the bond-length variation, corresponding to the vector potential in the effective mass picture, and fluctuating scalar potential are included in the formalism. The samples are modeled as self-similar surfaces characterized by the roughness exponent with values ranging from typical for graphene on SiO$_{2}$ to seen in suspended samples. The range of calculated resistivities and mobilities overlaps with experiment. The results presented here support the notion of rippling as one of the factors limiting the mobility.
The motion of a C60 molecule over a graphene sheet at finite temperature is investigated both theoretically and computationally. We show that a graphene sheet generates a van der Waals laterally periodic potential, which directly influences the motion of external objects in its proximity. The translational motion of a C60 molecule near a graphene sheet is found to be diffusive in the lateral directions. While, in the perpendicular direction, the motion may be described as diffusion in an effective harmonic potential which is determined from the distribution function of the position of the C60 molecule. We also examine the rotational diffusion of C60 and show that its motion over the graphene sheet is not a rolling motion.
One-dimensional systems often possess multiple channels or bands arising from the excitation of transverse degrees of freedom. In the present work, we study the specific processes that dominate the equilibration of multi-channel Fermi gases at low temperatures. Focusing on the case of two channels, we perform an analysis of the relaxation properties of these systems by studying the spectrum and eigenmodes of the linearized collision integral. As an application of this analysis, a detailed calculation of the bulk viscosity is presented. The dominant scattering processes obey an unexpected conservation law which is likely to affect the hydrodynamic behavior of these systems.
Two experimental studies reported the spontaneous formation of amorphous and crystalline structures of C60 intercalated between graphene and a substrate. They observed interesting phenomena ranging from reaction between C60 molecules under graphene to graphene sagging between the molecules and control of strain in graphene. Motivated by these works, we performed fully atomistic reactive molecular dynamics simulations to study the formation and thermal stability of graphene wrinkles as well as graphene attachment to and detachment from the substrate when graphene is laid over a previously distributed array of C60 molecules on a copper substrate at different values of temperature. As graphene compresses the C60 molecules against the substrate, and graphene attachment to the substrate between C60s (C60s stands for plural of C60) depends on the height of graphene wrinkles, configurations with both frozen and non-frozen C60s structures were investigated in order to verify the experimental result of stable sagged graphene when the distance between C60s is about 4 nm and height of graphene wrinkles is about 0.8 nm. Below the distance of 4 nm between C60s, graphene becomes locally suspended and less strained. We show that this happens when C60s are allowed to deform under the compressive action of graphene. If we keep the C60s frozen, spontaneous blanketing of graphene happens only when the distance between them are equal or above 7 nm. Both above results for the existence of stable sagged graphene for C60 distances of 4 or 7 nm are shown to agree with a mechanical model relating the rigidity of graphene to the energy of graphene-substrate adhesion. In particular, this study might help the development of 2D confined nanoreactors that are considered in literature to be the next advanced step on chemical reactions.
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.