Morphology engineering and etching of graphene domain by low-pressure chemical vapor deposition

Abstract

Controlled growth of single-crystal high-quality ‘track-and-field ground’ shaped graphene domains and the morphological evolution from hexagonal to hexagram graphene domain even square and circular graphene domain has been achieved by low-pressure CVD on solid copper substrate, thereby demonstrating that the shape of the graphene grains can potentially be precisely tuned by optimizing growth parameters. The etching reaction of graphene has also been studied, and results show that a low flow rate of hydrogen (99.999%) is favorable to form hexagonal structure for the etching reaction of graphene due to the exist of oxygen or oxidizing impurities in hydrogen gas commonly used. Controlled growth and etching reaction of graphene determine the final shape of graphene domains and all these efforts contribute to the study of size and morphology and the growth mechanism of graphene domains. Keywords: Graphene, ‘Track-and-field ground’ shaped, Morphological evolution, Hexagram, Square-shaped, Etching, LPCVD