Excitonic fano resonance in free-standing graphene.

We investigate the role of electron-hole correlations in the absorption of free-standing monolayer and bilayer graphene using optical transmission spectroscopy from 1.5 to 5.5 eV. Line shape analysis demonstrates that the ultraviolet region is dominated by an asymmetric Fano resonance. We attribute this to an excitonic resonance that forms near the van Hove singularity at the saddle point of the band structure and couples to the Dirac continuum. The Fano model quantitatively describes the experimental data all the way down to the infrared. In contrast, the common noninteracting particle picture cannot describe our data. These results suggest a profound connection between the absorption properties and the topology of the graphene band structure.

Graphene on a hydrophobic substrate: doping reduction and hysteresis suppression under ambient conditions.

The intrinsic doping level of graphene prepared by mechanical exfoliation and standard lithography procedures on thermally oxidized silicon varies significantly and seems to depend strongly on processing details and the substrate morphology. Moreover, transport properties of such graphene devices suffer from hysteretic behavior under ambient conditions. The hysteresis presumably originates from dipolar adsorbates on the substrate or graphene surface. Here, we demonstrate that it is possible to reliably obtain low intrinsic doping levels and to strongly suppress hysteretic behavior even in ambient air by depositing graphene on top of a thin, hydrophobic self-assembled layer of hexamethyldisilazane (HMDS). The HMDS serves as a reproducible template that prevents the adsorption of dipolar substances. It may also screen the influence of substrate deficiencies.

Fabrication of an array of single-electron transistors for a scanning probe microscope sensor.

A technique for the fabrication of single-electron transistors (SETs) on tips for use in scanning probe microscopy is presented. The tips are micromachined out of an MBE-grown AlGaAs-GaAs heterostructure with a trench within each tip. The SETs are produced by aluminum evaporation and oxidation, and natural shadowing by the trench is used to separate the source and drain electrodes. By separating adjacent tips also by trenches, the concept allows the fabrication of tip arrays for parallel probing.