Fold-assisted transport in graphene systems

Deformations in graphene systems are central elements in the novel field of straintronics. Various strain geometries have been proposed to produce specific properties but their experimental realization has been limited. Because strained folds can be engineered on graphene samples on appropriate substrates, we study their effects on graphene transport properties. We show the existence of an enhanced local density of states (LDOS) along the direction of the strained fold that originates from localization of higher energy states, and provides extra conductance channels at lower energies. In addition to exhibit sublattice symmetry breaking, these states are valley polarized, with quasi-ballistic properties in smooth disorder potentials. We confirmed that these results persist in the presence of strong edge disorder, making these geometries viable electronic waveguides. These findings could be tested in properly engineered experimental settings.

Physical Review B, 2011

We consider the effect of uniaxial strain on ballistic transport in graphene, across single and multiple tunneling barriers. Specifically, we show that applied strain not only shifts the position of the Dirac points in reciprocal space, but also induces a deformation of the Dirac cones, and that both effects are of the same order on the applied strain intensity. We therefore study the deviations thereby induced on the angular dependence of the tunneling transmission across a single barrier, as well as on the conductivity and Fano factor across a single barrier and a superstructure of several, periodically repeated, such sharp barriers. Our model is generalized to the case of nonuniform barriers, where either the strain or the gate potential profiles may depend continuously on position. This should afford a more accurate description of realistic 'origami' nanodevices based on graphene, where 'foldings' are expected to involve several lattice spacings.

Nano Letters

Confinement of electrons in graphene to make devices has proven to be a challenging task. Electrostatic methods fail because of Klein tunneling, while etching into nanoribbons requires extreme control of edge terminations, and bottom-up approaches are limited in size to a few nm. Fortunately, its mechanical flexibility raises the possibility of using strain to alter graphene's properties and create novel straintronic devices. Here, we report transport studies of nanowires created by linearly-shaped strained regions resulting from individual folds formed by layer transfer onto hexagonal boron nitride. Conductance measurements across the folds reveal Coulomb blockade signatures, indicating confined charges within these structures, which act as quantum dots. Along folds, we observe sharp features in traverse resistivity measurements, attributed 1 arXiv:1804.00207v1 [cond-mat.mes-hall] 31 Mar 2018 to an amplification of the dot conductance modulations by a resistance bridge incorporating the device. Our data indicates ballistic transport up to ∼1 µm along the folds. Calculations using the Dirac model including strain are consistent with measured bound state energies and predict the existence of valley-polarized currents. Our results show that graphene folds can act as straintronic quantum wires.

Nano Letters, 2012

Wrinkling is a ubiquitous phenomenon in twodimensional membranes. In particular, in the large-scale growth of graphene on metallic substrates, high densities of wrinkles are commonly observed. Despite their prevalence and potential impact on large-scale graphene electronics, relatively little is known about their structural morphology and electronic properties. Surveying the graphene landscape using atomic force microscopy, we found that wrinkles reach a certain maximum height before folding over. Calculations of the energetics explain the morphological transition and indicate that the tall ripples are collapsed into narrow standing wrinkles by van der Waals forces, analogous to large-diameter nanotubes. Quantum transport calculations show that conductance through these "collapsed wrinkle" structures is limited mainly by a density-of-states bottleneck and by interlayer tunneling across the collapsed bilayer region. Also through systematic measurements across large numbers of devices with wide "folded wrinkles", we find a distinct anisotropy in their electrical resistivity, consistent with our transport simulations. These results highlight the coupling between morphology and electronic properties, which has important practical implications for large-scale high-speed graphene electronics.

Physical Review B, 2018

Straintronic devices made of carbon-based materials have been pushed up due to the graphene high mechanical flexibility and the possibility of interesting changes in transport properties. Properly designed strained systems have been proposed to allow optimized transport responses that can be explored in experimental realizations. In multi-terminal systems, comparisons between schemes with different geometries are important to characterize the modifications introduced by mechanical deformations, specially if the deformations are localized at a central part of the system or extended in a large region. Then, in the present analysis, we study the strain effects on the transport properties of triangular and hexagonal graphene flakes, with zigzag and armchair edges, connected to three electronic terminals, formed by semi-infinite graphene nanoribbons. Using the Green's function formalism with circular renormalization schemes, and a single band tight-binding approximation, we find that resonant tunneling transport becomes relevant and is more affected by localized deformations in the hexagonal graphene flakes. Moreover, triangular systems with deformation extended to the leads, like longitudinal three-folded type, are shown as an interesting scenario for building nanoscale waveguides for electronic current.

Nanoscale, 2016

As most materials available in macroscopic quantities, graphene appears in a polycrystalline form and thus contains grain boundaries. In the present work, the effect of uniaxial strain on the electronic transport properties through graphene grain boundaries is investigated using atomistic simulations. A systematic picture of the transport properties with respect to the strain and the lattice symmetry of graphene domains on both sides of the boundary is provided. In particular, it is shown that the strain engineering can be used to open a finite transport gap in all graphene systems where two domains exhibit different orientations. This gap value is found to depend on the strain magnitude, on the strain direction and on the lattice symmetry of graphene domains. By choosing appropriately the strain direction, a large transport gap of a few hundred meV can be achieved when applying a small strain of only a few percents. For a specific class of graphene grain boundary systems, the strain engineering can also be used to reduce the scattering on defects and hence to significantly enhance the conductance. With a large strain-induced gap, these graphene heterostructures are proposed to be possible candidates for highly sensitive strain sensors, flexible transistors and p-n junctions with a strong non-linear I-V characteristics.

Nanotechnology, 2011

Electronic transport properties of monolayer graphene with extreme physical bending up to 90 o angle are studied using ab Initio first-principle calculations. The importance of key structural parameters including step height, curvature radius and bending angle are discussed how they modify the transport properties of the deformed graphene sheet comparing to the corresponding flat ones. The local density of state reveals that energy state modification caused by the physical bending is highly localized. It is observed that the transport properties of bent graphene with a wide range of geometrical configurations are insensitive to the structural deformation in the low-energy transmission spectra, even in the extreme case of bending. The results support that graphene, with its superb electromechanical robustness, could serve as a viable material platform in a spectrum of applications such as photovoltaics, flexible electronics, OLED, and 3D electronic chips.

Nano Research, 2008

Nano Letters, 2010

Particular strain geometry in graphene could leads to a uniform pseudo-magnetic field of order 10T and might open up interesting applications in graphene nano-electronics. Through quantum transport calculations of realistic strained graphene flakes of sizes of 100nm, we examine possible means of exploiting this effect for practical electronics and valleytronics devices. First, we found that elastic backscattering at rough edges leads to the formation of well defined transport gaps of order 100meV under moderate maximum strain of 10%. Second, the application of a real magnetic field induced a separation, in space and energy, of the states arising from different valleys, leading to a way of inducing bulk valley polarization which is insensitive to short range scattering.

Physical Review Letters, 2009

We propose a route to all-graphene integrated electronic devices by exploring the influence of strain on the electronic structure of graphene. We show that strain can be easily tailored to generate electron beam collimation, 1D channels, surface states and confinement, the basic elements for allgraphene electronics. In addition this proposal has the advantage that patterning can be made on substrates rather than on the graphene sheet, thereby protecting the integrity of the latter. PACS numbers: 81.05.Uw,85.30.Mn,73.90.+f 1 arXiv:0810.4539v3 [cond-mat.mes-hall]