Creating Reversible p-n Junction on Graphene through Ferritin Adsorption
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Updated: Mar 24, 2026

Fabrication of Gate-tunable Graphene Devices for Scanning Tunneling Microscopy Studies with Coulomb Impurities
Published on: July 24, 2015
Yana Mulyana1, Mutsunori Uenuma1, Naofumi Okamoto1
1Nara Institute of Science and Technology, Graduate School of Materials Science , 8916-5 Takayama, Ikoma, Nara 630-0192, Japan.
Abstract:
An alternative way to construct a stable p-n junction on graphene-based field effect transistor (G-FET) through physical adsorption of ferritin (spherical protein shell) is presented. The produced p-n junction on G-FET could also operate through water-gate. Native ferritins are known to be negatively charged in wet condition; however, we found that native negatively charged ferritins became positively charged after performing electron beam (EB)-irradiation. We utilized this property to construct p-n junction on G-FET. We found also that EB-irradiation could remove the effect of charged impurity adsorbed on graphene layer, thus the Dirac point was adjusted to gate voltage Vg = 0.

