Toward Clean Suspended CVD Graphene

Published

August 26, 2016

Author(s)

Alexander Yulaev, Guangjun Cheng, Angela R. Hight Walker, Ivan Vlassiouk, Alline Myers, Marina S. Leite, Andrei Kolmakov

Abstract

The application of suspended graphene as electron transparent supporting media in electron microscopy, vacuum electronics, and micromechanical devices requires the least destructive and maximally clean transfer from their original growth substrate to the target of interest. Here, we use thermally evaporated anthracene films as the sacrificial layer for graphene transfer onto an arbitrary substrate. We show that clean suspended graphene can be achieved via desorbing the anthracene layer at temperatures in the 100 oC to 150 oC range, followed by two sequential annealing steps for the final cleaning, using Pt catalyst and activated carbon. The cleanliness of the suspended graphene membranes was analyzed employing the high surface sensitivity of low energy scanning electron microscopy and x-ray photoelectron spectroscopy. A quantitative comparison with two other commonly used transfer methods revealed the superiority of the anthracene approach to obtain larger area of clean, suspended CVD graphene. Our solvent-free method of graphene transfer onto arbitrary substrates paves the way for integrating graphene in complex devices that are not compatible with wet treatments.

Citation

RSC Advances

Volume

6

Issue

87

Pub Type

Journals

Download Paper

https://doi.org/10.1039/C6RA17360H

Local Download

Keywords

graphene transfer, anthracene, purity, scanning electron microscopy

Citation

Yulaev, A. , Cheng, G. , Hight Walker, A. , Vlassiouk, I. , Myers, A. , Leite, M. and Kolmakov, A. (2016), Toward Clean Suspended CVD Graphene, RSC Advances, [online], https://doi.org/10.1039/C6RA17360H, https://tsapps.nist.gov/publication/get_pdf.cfm?pub_id=920904 (Accessed April 19, 2024)