Switchable friction enabled by nanoscale self-assembly on graphene

Patrick Gallagher, Menyoung Lee, Francois Amet, Petro Maksymovych, Jun Wang, Shuopei Wang, Xiaobo Lu, Guangyu Zhang, Kenji Watanabe, Takashi Taniguchi and David Goldhaber-Gordon ()
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Patrick Gallagher: Stanford University
Menyoung Lee: Stanford University
Francois Amet: Duke University
Petro Maksymovych: Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Jun Wang: Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Shuopei Wang: Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Xiaobo Lu: Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Guangyu Zhang: Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences
Kenji Watanabe: National Institute for Materials Science
Takashi Taniguchi: National Institute for Materials Science
David Goldhaber-Gordon: Stanford University

Nature Communications, 2016, vol. 7, issue 1, 1-7

Abstract: Abstract Graphene monolayers are known to display domains of anisotropic friction with twofold symmetry and anisotropy exceeding 200%. This anisotropy has been thought to originate from periodic nanoscale ripples in the graphene sheet, which enhance puckering around a sliding asperity to a degree determined by the sliding direction. Here we demonstrate that these frictional domains derive not from structural features in the graphene but from self-assembly of environmental adsorbates into a highly regular superlattice of stripes with period 4–6 nm. The stripes and resulting frictional domains appear on monolayer and multilayer graphene on a variety of substrates, as well as on exfoliated flakes of hexagonal boron nitride. We show that the stripe-superlattices can be reproducibly and reversibly manipulated with submicrometre precision using a scanning probe microscope, allowing us to create arbitrary arrangements of frictional domains within a single flake. Our results suggest a revised understanding of the anisotropic friction observed on graphene and bulk graphite in terms of adsorbates.

Date: 2016
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DOI: 10.1038/ncomms10745

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