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Direct visualization of large-area graphene domains and boundaries by optical birefringency

Nature Nanotechnology volume 7, pages 29–34 (2012)Cite this article

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Abstract

The boundaries between domains in single-layer graphene1,2,3,4 strongly influence its electronic properties5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12. However, existing approaches for domain visualization, which are based on microscopy and spectroscopy2,12,13,14,15,16, are only effective for domains that are less than a few micrometres in size. Here, we report a simple method for the visualization of arbitrarily large graphene domains by imaging the birefringence of a graphene surface covered with nematic liquid crystals. The method relies on a correspondence between the orientation of the liquid crystals and that of the underlying graphene, which we use to determine the boundaries of macroscopic domains.

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Figure 1: Schematic of 4-n-alkyl-4′-cyanobiphenyl (nCB) liquid crystals on graphene and TEM image of the graphene film and its domain boundary.
Figure 2: Optical visibility of the domain boundaries of graphene using aligned liquid-crystal material (5CB) and birefringent colour transition while rotating the sample.
Figure 3: Schematic of liquid crystal alignment on the surface of the graphene.
Figure 4: Thermal and electric-field recovery of liquid-crystal molecules (5CB) on graphene.
Figure 5: Relationships between copper domains and graphene domains.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported by the National Research Laboratory Program (R0A-2007-000-20037-0, NRF), World Class University Program (R32-2008-000-10142-0, NRF), and the Global Frontier Research Center for Advanced Soft Electronics. The authors especially appreciate helpful discussions with Prof. Mohan Srinivasarao.

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  1. Dae Woo Kim and Yun Ho Kim: These authors contributed equally to this work

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Eng. (BK-21), National Research Lab, for Organic Opto-Electronic Materials, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology, Daejeon, 305-701, Korea

    Dae Woo Kim, Yun Ho Kim, Hyeon Su Jeong & Hee-Tae Jung

  2. Department of Biomedical Engineering, Washington University in St Louis, 1 Brookings Drive, St Louis, 63130, Missouri, USA

    Yun Ho Kim

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  1. Dae Woo Kim
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Contributions

D.W.K., Y.H.K., H.S.J. and H-T.J. wrote the paper. D.W.K., Y.H.K. and H-T.J. conceived and directed the research. D.W.K. prepared graphene and carried out characterization using electron microscopy. D.W.K., Y.H.K. and H.S.J. carried out liquid-crystal cell experiments and interpreted liquid-crystal alignment on the graphene.

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Correspondence to Hee-Tae Jung.

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Kim, D., Kim, Y., Jeong, H. et al. Direct visualization of large-area graphene domains and boundaries by optical birefringency. Nature Nanotech 7, 29–34 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/nnano.2011.198

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