Strain-Induced Change in the Photonic Properties of Dumbbell-Shaped Graphene Nanoribbon Structures

Abstract

The ribbon width dependency of graphene nanoribbons (GNR) on the electronic properties showed promising applications in the development of advanced photonic devices, such as multi-bandgap photovoltaic devices. However, large periodic oscillations due to the change in the number of carbon atoms is a major limitation. To effectively control the electronic band properties of the fabricated GNR-based device, in this study, application of strain to the GNR’s is proposed. This study experimentally validates the theoretical concept on an 80-nm ribbon width dumbbell-shaped-GNR structure. The device showed about clear change in the electronic properties under 3 different strain conditions with an observed gauge factor of about 1500. Under an irradiation of a focused laser beam, the device showed an improvement of about 4.5 times under applied strain when compared to an unstrained sample.