Edge-Driven Fringe-Field Effects, Reduced Screening, and Bandgap Widening in Graphene Nanoribbons Enable...

Graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) offer promising platforms for single-molecule sensing due to their quasi-1D channels and discrete electronic states, providing superior sensitivity toward molecular perturbations. While prior studies emphasize smoother edges as essential for optimal performance, the potential benefits of controlled edge roughness remain largely unexplored. Additionally, most investigations focus on GNR arrays, leaving critical edge- and width-dependent factors, including fringe fields, bandgap widening, interactions between adsorbing molecules and GNR atoms, density of states (DOS) suppression, and electrostatic screening lengths, and their collective impact on sensitivity, poorly understood. Here, we fabricated field-effect transistors using individual GNRs (widths: 200-20 nm) and characterized their response to molecular adsorption with perfluorooctanoic acid as the model analyte. Narrower ribbons displayed significantly enhanced sensitivity, yielding a coverage-normalized response of 116 ± 10 mV per molecule in 20 nm-wide GNRs (from calibrated ensemble Dirac-point shifts). Experimental and theoretical analyses reveal that this heightened sensitivity arises from stronger fringe fields, width-dependent quantum confinement effects, reduced DOS, and increased edge roughness that facilitates molecular anchoring, enhanced orbital overlap, and improved charge transfer efficiency. Our findings challenge the conventional assumption that smoother edges inherently enhance sensor performance, demonstrating that controlled edge disorder substantially boosts molecular sensitivity in GNR sensors.