@article{Song2025, 
author = {Xiaofeng Song and Pengbo Bian and Shining Xu and Qin Li and Yanyan Dong and Chengjin Wu and Anbang Zhu and Xiucai Sun and Luzhao Sun and Zhongfan Liu},
title = {Cyclotrimerization nucleation of dimeric carbon precursors for roll-to-roll synthesis of high-orientation graphene},
year = {2025},
journal = {Nano Research},
volume = {18},
number = {8},
pages = {94907560},
keywords = {graphene, chemical vapor deposition, nucleation, crystallographic orientation, carbon source, acetylene},
url = {https://www.sciopen.com/article/10.26599/NR.2025.94907560},
doi = {10.26599/NR.2025.94907560},
abstract = {Scalable synthesis of high-quality graphene via roll-to-roll chemical vapor deposition faces a fundamental conflict between rapid growth and crystallographic perfection. Conventional methane (CH4)-derived growth suffers from disordered nucleation and orientation mismatch at elevated precursor pressures, limiting industrial adoption. This work resolves this challenge by employing acetylene (C2H2) as a carbon precursor to enable carbon dimer-mediated cyclotrimerization nucleation. First-principles calculations reveal that C2H2-derived carbon dimers (C2) spontaneously assemble into hexagonal nuclei, bypassing defect-prone chain-to-ring transitions inherent to monatomic carbon pathway of CH4. This mechanism ensures > 98% lattice orientation consistency even at nucleation densities of 104 mm−2, in stark contrast to CH4-derived graphene. Crucially, the enhanced surface adsorption of C2 species enables continuous nucleation during lateral growth, achieving high growth rate of 500 mm·min−1 at roll-to-roll process. Leveraging dimeric carbon precursors and Cu single-crystallization technique, we demonstrate roll-to-roll production of graphene films with high crystallographic orientation across meter-scale Cu(111) foils. This precursor-specific strategy decouples nucleation density from disorder accumulation, establishing a scalable pathway for industrial graphene manufacturing.}
}