Metal Oxide
Nanoparticle Growth on Graphene via Chemical
Activation with Atomic Oxygen
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Abstract
Chemically interfacing the inert
basal plane of graphene with other
materials has limited the development of graphene-based catalysts,
composite materials, and devices. Here, we overcome this limitation
by chemically activating epitaxial graphene on SiC(0001) using atomic
oxygen. Atomic oxygen produces epoxide groups on graphene, which act
as reactive nucleation sites for zinc oxide nanoparticle growth using
the atomic layer deposition precursor diethyl zinc. In particular,
exposure of epoxidized graphene to diethyl zinc abstracts oxygen,
creating mobile species that diffuse on the surface to form metal
oxide clusters. This mechanism is corroborated with a combination
of scanning probe microscopy, Raman spectroscopy, and density functional
theory and can likely be generalized to a wide variety of related
surface reactions on graphene