Quantum confined electronic states in atomically well-defined graphene nanostructures

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Volume Title

A1 Alkuperäisartikkeli tieteellisessä aikakauslehdessä

Date

2011

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Mcode

Degree programme

Language

en

Pages

1-5

Series

PHYSICAL REVIEW LETTERS, Volume 107, issue 23

Abstract

Despite the enormous interest in the properties of graphene and the potential of graphene nanostructures in electronic applications, the study of quantum-confined states in atomically well-defined graphene nanostructures remains an experimental challenge. Here, we study graphene quantum dots (GQDs) with well-defined edges in the zigzag direction, grown by chemical vapor deposition on an Ir(111) substrate by low-temperature scanning tunneling microscopy and spectroscopy. We measure the atomic structure and local density of states of individual GQDs as a function of their size and shape in the range from a couple of nanometers up to ca. 20 nm. The results can be quantitatively modeled by a relativistic wave equation and atomistic tight-binding calculations. The observed states are analogous to the solutions of the textbook “particle-in-a-box” problem applied to relativistic massless fermions.

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Keywords

graphene, quantum dot, scanning tunneling microscopy

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Citation

Hämäläinen , S , Sun , Z , Boneschanscher , M P , Uppstu , C , Ijäs , M , Harju , A , Vanmaekelbergh , D & Liljeroth , P 2011 , ' Quantum confined electronic states in atomically well-defined graphene nanostructures ' , Physical Review Letters , vol. 107 , no. 23 , 236803 , pp. 1-5 . https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevLett.107.236803