Hydrophilic, Clean Graphene for Cell Culture and Cryo-EM Imaging

The wettability of graphene is critical for numerous applications but is very sensitive to its surface cleanness. Herein, by clarifying the impact of intrinsic contamination, i.e., amorphous carbon, which is formed on the graphene surface during the high-temperature chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process, the hydrophilic nature of clean graphene grown on single-crystal Cu(111) substrate was confirmed by both experimental and theoretical studies, with an average water contact angle of ∼23°. Furthermore, the wettability of as-transferred graphene was proven to be highly dependent on its intrinsic cleanness, because of which the hydrophilic, clean graphene exhibited improved performance when utilized for cell culture and cryoelectron microscopy imaging. This work not only validates the intrinsic hydrophilic nature of graphene but also provides a new insight in developing advanced bioapplications using CVD-grown clean graphene films.