Technique offers support to single-crystal graphene monolayers

This is the claim of a team from KAUST, Saudi Arabia who said most graphene-based electronic devices require insulating supports. They added that high-quality graphene films destined for industrial use are typically grown on a metal substrate, such as copper foil, before being transferred to an insulating support for device fabrication. This transfer step can introduce impurities that affect how well the device performs. Consequently, efforts to grow graphene on insulating supports have not been able to produce the required high-quality single crystals.

“If graphene can be grown on an insulating substrate with a clean interface, certain devices might function better,” said Ph.D. student Bo Tian, who co-led the study under the supervision of Professor Xixiang Zhang from KAUST’s Physical Science and Engineering Division. “This also opens the door to new types of graphene-based nanodevices.”