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Published on: March 4, 2021
On-surface Synthesis of a Chiral Graphene Nanoribbon with Mixed Edge Structure
Ashok Keerthi1, Carlos Sánchez-Sánchez2,3, Okan Deniz2
1Department of Chemistry, The University of Manchester, Oxford road, Manchester, M13 9PL, UK.
Abstract:
Chiral graphene nanoribbons represent an important class of graphene nanomaterials with varying combinations of armchair and zigzag edges conferring them unique structure-dependent electronic properties. Here, we describe the on-surface synthesis of an unprecedented cove-edge chiral GNR with a benzo-fused backbone on a Au(111) surface using 2,6-dibromo-1,5-diphenylnaphthalene as precursor. The initial precursor self-assembly and the formation of the chiral GNRs upon annealing are revealed, along with a relatively small electronic bandgap of approximately 1.6 eV, by scanning tunnelling microscopy and spectroscopy.
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