Publication

Band Gap of Atomically Precise Graphene Nanoribbons as a Function of Ribbon Length and Termination

Abstract

We study the band gap of finite NA=7 armchair graphene nanoribbons (7-AGNRs) on Au(111) through scanning tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy combined with density functional theory calculations. The band gap of 7-AGNRs with lengths of 8 nm and more is converged to within 50 meV of its bulk value of approximate to 2.3eV, while the band gap opens by several hundred meV in very short 7-AGNRs. We demonstrate that even an atomic defect, such as the addition of one hydrogen atom at the termini, has a significant effect - in this case, lowering the band gap. The effect can be captured in terms of a simple analytical model by introducing an effective "electronic length".

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Related concepts (23)
Scanning tunneling microscope
A scanning tunneling microscope (STM) is a type of microscope used for imaging surfaces at the atomic level. Its development in 1981 earned its inventors, Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer, then at IBM Zürich, the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1986. STM senses the surface by using an extremely sharp conducting tip that can distinguish features smaller than 0.1 nm with a 0.01 nm (10 pm) depth resolution. This means that individual atoms can routinely be imaged and manipulated.
Scanning probe microscopy
Scanning probe microscopy (SPM) is a branch of microscopy that forms images of surfaces using a physical probe that scans the specimen. SPM was founded in 1981, with the invention of the scanning tunneling microscope, an instrument for imaging surfaces at the atomic level. The first successful scanning tunneling microscope experiment was done by Gerd Binnig and Heinrich Rohrer. The key to their success was using a feedback loop to regulate gap distance between the sample and the probe.
Atomic number
The atomic number or nuclear charge number (symbol Z) of a chemical element is the charge number of an atomic nucleus. For ordinary nuclei composed of protons and neutrons, this is equal to the proton number (np) or the number of protons found in the nucleus of every atom of that element. The atomic number can be used to uniquely identify ordinary chemical elements. In an ordinary uncharged atom, the atomic number is also equal to the number of electrons.
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