Mar 30, 2008

The environment of graphene probed by electrostatic force microscopy

A group of researchers formed by members of the Quantum Nanolectronics group (J. Moser, A. Barreiro, and A. Bachtol) amd members of the Small Molecules on surfaces in ambient and pristine conditions (A. Verdaguer) at CIN2 (CSIC-ICN) published the work 'The environment of graphene probed by electrostatic force microscopy' on Applied Physics Letters.

These researchers employ electrostatic force microscopy to study the electrostatic environment of graphene sheets prepared with the micromechanical exfoliation technique. They detect the electric dipole of residues left from the adhesive tape during graphene preparation, as well as the dipole of water molecules adsorbed on top of graphene. Water molecules form a dipole layer that can generate an electric field as large as 10^9 V/m. They expect that water molecules can significantly modify the electrical properties of graphene devices.

+ DOI: 10.1063/1.2898501