Reversible optical doping of graphene

The ultimate surface exposure provided by graphene monolayer makes it the ideal sensor platform but also exposes its intrinsic properties to any environmental perturbations. In this work, we demonstrate that the charge carrier density of graphene exfoliated on a SiO2/Si substrate can be finely and reversibly tuned between hole and electron doping with visible photons. This photo-induced doping happens under moderate laser power conditions but is significantly affected by the substrate cleaning method. In particular, it requires hydrophilic substrates and vanishes for suspended graphene. These findings suggest that optically gated graphene devices operating with a sub-second time scale can be envisioned and that Raman spectroscopy is not always as non-invasive as generally assumed.