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Nano Research 2020, 13(7): 1789-1794 https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-020-2638-7
Research Article | Issue | Published: 23 January 2020

Dynamic observation of in-plane h-BN/graphene heterostructures growth on Ni(111)

Show Author's Information Wei Wei1,§,  Jiaqi Pan1,§,  Chanan Euaruksakul2,  Yang Yang3,  Yi Cui1( ),  Qiang Fu3,  Xinhe Bao3,4( )
Vacuum Interconnected Nanotech Workstation, Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Suzhou 215123, China
Synchrotron Light Research Institute, Nakhon Ratchasima 30000, Thailand
State Key Laboratory of Catalysis, iChEM, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dalian 116023, China
Department of Chemical Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China

§ Wei Wei and Jiaqi Pan contributed equally to this work.

Keywords:
graphene, hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN), in-plane heterostructures, growth dynamics
Topics:
Boron nitrideChemical vapor depositionDynamics GrapheneIIINitridesSubstratesV semiconductors
Cite this article:
Wei W, Pan J, Euaruksakul C, et al. Dynamic observation of in-plane h-BN/graphene heterostructures growth on Ni(111). Nano Research, 2020, 13(7): 1789-1794. https://doi.org/10.1007/s12274-020-2638-7
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Abstract Full text Electronic supplementary material About this article

The lateral incorporation of graphene and hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) onto a substrate surface creates in-plane h-BN/graphene heterostructures, which have promising applications in novel two-dimensional electronic and photoelectronic devices. The quality of h-BN/graphene domain boundaries depends on their orientation, which is crucial for device performances. Here, the heteroepitaxial growth of graphene along the edges of h-BN domains on Ni(111) surfaces as well as the growth dynamics of h-BN using chemical vapor deposition (CVD) are in situ investigated by surface imaging measurements. The nucleating seed effect of h-BN has been revealed, which contributes to the single orientation of heterostructures with epitaxial stitching. Further, the growth of h-BN prior to that of graphene is essential to obtain high-quality in-plane h-BN/graphene heterostructures on Ni(111). The "compact to fractal" shape transition of h-BN domains appears with the increasing surface concentration of the growth blocks, suggesting that the dynamic growth mechanism follows diffusion-limited aggregation (DLA) but not reaction-limited aggregation (RLA). Our results provide insights into the synthesis of well-defined h-BN/graphene heterostructures and deep understanding of the growth dynamics of h-BN on metal surfaces.


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Electronic supplementary material
About this article

Dynamic observation of in-plane h-BN/graphene heterostructures growth on Ni(111)

Show Author's information Wei Wei1,§, Jiaqi Pan1,§, Chanan Euaruksakul2, Yang Yang3, Yi Cui1( ), Qiang Fu3, Xinhe Bao3,4( )
Vacuum Interconnected Nanotech Workstation, Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Suzhou 215123, China
Synchrotron Light Research Institute, Nakhon Ratchasima 30000, Thailand
State Key Laboratory of Catalysis, iChEM, Dalian Institute of Chemical Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Dalian 116023, China
Department of Chemical Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China

§ Wei Wei and Jiaqi Pan contributed equally to this work.

Abstract

The lateral incorporation of graphene and hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) onto a substrate surface creates in-plane h-BN/graphene heterostructures, which have promising applications in novel two-dimensional electronic and photoelectronic devices. The quality of h-BN/graphene domain boundaries depends on their orientation, which is crucial for device performances. Here, the heteroepitaxial growth of graphene along the edges of h-BN domains on Ni(111) surfaces as well as the growth dynamics of h-BN using chemical vapor deposition (CVD) are in situ investigated by surface imaging measurements. The nucleating seed effect of h-BN has been revealed, which contributes to the single orientation of heterostructures with epitaxial stitching. Further, the growth of h-BN prior to that of graphene is essential to obtain high-quality in-plane h-BN/graphene heterostructures on Ni(111). The "compact to fractal" shape transition of h-BN domains appears with the increasing surface concentration of the growth blocks, suggesting that the dynamic growth mechanism follows diffusion-limited aggregation (DLA) but not reaction-limited aggregation (RLA). Our results provide insights into the synthesis of well-defined h-BN/graphene heterostructures and deep understanding of the growth dynamics of h-BN on metal surfaces.

Keywords: graphene, hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN), in-plane heterostructures, growth dynamics

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Acknowledgements

Publication history

Received: 12 November 2019
Revised: 15 December 2019
Accepted: 02 January 2020
Published: 23 January 2020
Issue date: July 2020

Copyright

© Tsinghua University Press and Springer-Verlag GmbH Germany, part of Springer Nature 2020

Acknowledgements

This work was financially supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China (No. 21872169), Natural Science Foundation of Jiangsu Province (No. BK20170426). The authors are grateful for the support for Synchrotron Light Research Institute (SLRI) in Thailand, and the help from Ms. Xiao Chen and Mr. Hu Wang with current magnetron sputtering experiments in Nano-X from Suzhou Institute of Nano-Tech and Nano-Bionics, CAS.

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