Fang Ying

Fabrication of suspended graphene devices and their electronic properties

Suspended graphene devices are successfully fabricated by using a novel PMMA/MMA/PMMA tri-layer resist technique. The gap between graphene and dielectric substrate can be easily controlled by the thickness of the bottom PMMA layer, and no wet-etching with hazardous hydrofluoric acid is involved in our fabrication process. Electrical characterizations on suspended graphene devices are performed in vacuum when in-situ current annealing directly leads to a significant improvement on transport properties of graphene, i.e., the increase of carrier mobility with the reduction of width of Dirac peak. Our results make a new opportunity to study intrinsic properties of graphene.

Controlled construction of nanostructures in graphene

We report on the laser-assisted fabrications of nanostructures in graphene membranes supported on polymer films. By using a laser beam to deposit heat locally, irradiated polymer instantaneously melts and vaporizes. During laser drilling of the polymer, the single-layer graphene membrane adheres to the polymer surface and consequently forms tens of nanometer deep wells. Due to the short time scale of laser irradiation, heat diffusion in the polymer is negligible, and the excitation energy is highly confined in the polymer. As a result, graphene nanowells of hundreds of nanometers in diameter can be patterned with high fidelity. With the increasing of nanowell density, we observe the spontaneous formation of nanowrinkles connecting pairs of nanowells in the graphene membranes. Importantly, Raman spectra confirm that no defects are introduced in graphene membranes by laser irradiation under our experimental conditions. Our results highlight the possibility to construct nanostructures and to design novel devices based on graphene.