Suspended graphene propagation plasmon waveguide device and preparation method thereof
Technical Field
The invention relates to the field of surface plasmons, in particular to a suspended graphene propagation plasmon device and a preparation method thereof.
Background
Graphene is a monoatomic layer two-dimensional material consisting of carbon atoms according to a hexagonal honeycomb lattice structure, and has good electrical properties including high carrier mobility, bipolar carrier characteristics, easily tunable carrier concentration and the like. In addition, the graphene has excellent mechanical properties, so that the stable existence of a suspended graphene structure can be supported.
The plasmon of the electronic resonance on the graphene can localize the incident optical field energy on the surface of the graphene to form a plasmon mode propagating along the surface of the graphene. Such plasmons have the excellent property of high local field confinement and easy tuning. However, graphene plasmons have a high attenuation ratio, mainly from two aspects: firstly, electrons in the graphene are subjected to phonon scattering, and secondly, the dielectric loss of a dielectric environment around plasmon polarization is caused. The attenuation of the graphene plasmons is reduced, and the realization of long-distance propagation is a key problem of the application of the graphene plasmons as waveguides.
Therefore, a suspended graphene propagation plasmon waveguide device and a preparation method thereof are needed, wherein the suspended graphene propagation plasmon waveguide device can effectively eliminate dielectric loss of graphene plasmons, reduce attenuation rate of the plasmons and further realize long-distance propagation.
Disclosure of Invention
In order to solve the technical problem, the present invention provides a suspended graphene propagating plasmon waveguide device, including: the substrate, the graphene layer and the electrode are arranged from bottom to top in sequence; the substrate comprises at least one pore structure for supporting the graphene layer and the electrodes;
the graphene layer covers the pore structure of the substrate to form a suspended graphene structure;
the electrode is used for electrical measurement and electrostatic regulation of graphene carrier concentration and is arranged on the graphene layer.
Preferably, the substrate has a geometric dimension of 500 μm to 5cm and a thickness of 1 μm to 5 cm; in the pore structure, pores are arranged in an array form, the spacing between the pores is 1 mu m-4cm, the pore diameter is 0.5 mu m-5cm, and the pore depth is 0.1 mu m-5 cm.
Preferably, the hole structure is a blind hole or through hole structure. The longitudinal section of the hole structure is of a step-shaped structure, and the transverse section of the hole structure is of a circular, oval, triangular, square, rectangular, pentagonal structure, regular hexagon or octagonal shape.
Preferably, the material of the substrate is metal, inorganic crystal or organic plastic; wherein the metal material is selected from iron, aluminum, copper, gold, silver, platinum, steel; the inorganic crystal material is selected from silicon, quartz, sapphire, calcium fluoride, magnesium fluoride, silicon nitride and gallium nitride.
Wherein the graphene layer can be doped using chemical doping and electrostatic modulation. Preferably, the number of graphene layers may be selected from 1 to 10 layers.
Preferably, the material of the electrode is selected from chromium, titanium, iron, aluminum, copper, gold, silver, platinum.
The plasmon can be excited in two ways, one is that scattered light of a needle tip of a mid-infrared scattering type scanning near-field optical microscope can directly excite the plasmon, and the other is that incident infrared light irradiates the boundary of a hole in a sample to excite the plasmon. And scanning the surface of the suspended sample by using the near-field optical microscope needle tip to obtain an interference pattern of the plasmon wave supported on the suspended graphene.
According to another aspect of the present invention, the present invention further provides a method for preparing a suspended graphene propagating plasmon waveguide device, including the following steps:
the method comprises the following steps: selecting a substrate, and preparing a hole structure on the substrate; the substrate is made of a firm, flat and stable material and can be selected from metal, inorganic crystal or organic plastic, the metal can be selected from Al, Cu, Au and steel, and the inorganic crystal can be selected from silicon, quartz and calcium fluoride.
Preferably, the substrate is silicon dioxide with the thickness of 300nm combined with a silicon wafer with the thickness of 500 mu m.
The method comprises the following steps of preparing a plurality of pore structures by utilizing a mechanical processing method, a dry etching method or a wet etching method, wherein the pore diameter of each pore structure is 0.5-5 cm, and the pore depth is 0.1-5 cm.
Preferably, the transverse section of the hole structure is in a shape of circle, ellipse, triangle, square, rectangle, pentagon, regular hexagon or octagon.
Preferably, the hole structure is a blind hole structure or a through hole structure, and the distance between the through holes is 1 μm-4 cm; the longitudinal section of the hole structure is of a step-shaped structure.
Step two: preparing a graphene film;
step three: placing a graphene film on the substrate, and covering a pore structure to form a suspended graphene layer;
step four: preparing an electrode structure, namely preparing electrodes by using methods such as thermal evaporation, electron beam evaporation, focused ion deposition, magnetron sputtering and the like;
step five: doping the graphene layer by using a chemical doping method or point-of-sale doping by using an electrode grid voltage; wherein, the chemical doping method is to use nitric acid vapor or nitrogen dioxide gas.
Step six: exciting and characterizing plasmons in a near field; the interference pattern of the plasmon wave supported on the suspended graphene can be obtained by directly exciting the plasmon by scattered light of a tip of a medium infrared scattering type scanning near field optical microscope (s-SNOM), or exciting the plasmon by irradiating incident light to the boundary of a hole in a sample, and scanning the surface of the sample by using the tip of the medium infrared scattering type scanning near field optical microscope (s-SNOM).
The sample is the suspended graphene propagation plasmon waveguide device prepared in the first step to the fifth step.
The invention provides a propagation plasmon supported on a suspended graphene structure, which can effectively eliminate the dielectric loss of the graphene plasmon and reduce the attenuation rate of the plasmon. In addition, due to the fact that the dielectric constant of air is small, the wavelength of a plasmon on the suspended graphene is long, and the long-wavelength propagation distance can be achieved by matching the characteristic of low attenuation of the suspended graphene.
It is to be understood that both the foregoing general description and the following detailed description are exemplary and explanatory only and are not restrictive of the invention, as claimed.
Drawings
Further objects, features and advantages of the present invention will become apparent from the following description of embodiments of the invention, with reference to the accompanying drawings, in which:
fig. 1a shows a schematic structural diagram of a suspended graphene propagating plasmon waveguide device in the present invention.
Fig. 1b shows a longitudinal cross-sectional view of a suspended graphene propagating plasmonic waveguide device in the present invention.
Fig. 2 shows a physical optical microscope photograph of a suspended graphene propagating plasmonic waveguide device.
Fig. 3a shows a near field image of suspended graphene plasmon modes scanned on 4 circular holes of different sizes excited using the mid-infrared scattering type scanning near field optical microscope (s-SNOM) tip.
Fig. 3b shows a boundary-excited suspended graphene plasmon mode near-field image, where single-layer graphene is on the left and 4-layer graphene is on the right.
Fig. 4 is an enlarged transverse cross-sectional view of the pore structure of the present invention.
Fig. 5 is a flowchart of a method for manufacturing a suspended graphene propagating plasmon waveguide device according to the present invention.
Detailed Description
The objects and functions of the present invention and methods for accomplishing the same will be apparent by reference to the exemplary embodiments. However, the present invention is not limited to the exemplary embodiments disclosed below; it can be implemented in different forms. The nature of the description is merely to assist those skilled in the relevant art in a comprehensive understanding of the specific details of the invention.
Hereinafter, embodiments of the present invention will be described with reference to the accompanying drawings. In the drawings, the same reference numerals denote the same or similar parts, or the same or similar steps.
Referring to fig. 1a and 1b, the present invention provides a suspended graphene propagating plasmon waveguide device 100, including: the substrate 101, the graphene layer 103 and the electrode 107 are arranged from bottom to top in sequence; the substrate 101 comprises at least one pore structure 102 for supporting a graphene layer 103 and an electrode 107; the graphene layer 103 covers the pore structure 102 of the substrate 101 to form a suspended graphene structure; the electrode 107 is used for electrical measurement and electrostatic regulation of graphene carrier concentration, and is placed on the graphene layer 103, as shown in fig. 1 b.
Specifically, the material of the substrate 101 is metal, inorganic crystal, or organic plastic; wherein the metal material is selected from iron, aluminum, copper, gold, silver, platinum, steel; the inorganic crystal material is selected from silicon, quartz, sapphire, calcium fluoride, magnesium fluoride, silicon nitride and gallium nitride. The substrate 101 has a geometric size of 500 μm to 5cm and a thickness of 1 μm to 5 cm; in the pore structure 102, pores are arranged in an array form, the spacing between the pores is 1 μm-4cm, the pore diameter is 0.5 μm-5cm, and the pore depth is 0.1 μm-5 cm. The graphene layer 103 may be doped by chemical doping or electrostatic modulation. Further, the number of graphene layers may be selected from 1 to 10 layers. The material of the electrode 107 is selected from chromium, titanium, iron, aluminum, copper, gold, silver and platinum.
Here, the interference pattern of the plasmon wave supported on suspended graphene can be obtained by directly exciting the plasmon 104 with scattered light of a tip 106 of a scanning near-field optical microscope (s-SNOM) of a mid-infrared scattering type, or exciting the plasmon 104 by irradiating the boundary of the pore structure 102 in the sample with incident light 105, and scanning the surface of the sample with the tip 106 of the above-mentioned scanning near-field optical microscope (s-SNOM) of a mid-infrared scattering type, as shown in fig. 1 a. Referring to fig. 2, a real object optical microscope photograph of the suspended graphene propagating plasmon waveguide device is shown.
Referring to fig. 3a and 3b, where fig. 3a is a near-field image of suspended graphene plasmon modes on 4 circular holes with different sizes scanned by using the s-SNOM tip, the measured diameters of the circular holes are: 0.5 μm,1 μm,1.5 μm, 2.5. mu.m. Fig. 3b is a boundary-excited suspended graphene plasmon mode near-field image, where the left side is single-layer graphene and the right side is 4-layer graphene.
According to a preferred embodiment of the present invention, the hole structure 102 is a through hole structure. The through hole has a stepped structure in longitudinal section (as shown in fig. 1 b), and has a circular, elliptical, triangular, square, rectangular, pentagonal, hexagonal, or octagonal transverse section (as shown in fig. 4a-4 g).
Referring to fig. 5, the present invention further provides a method for manufacturing a suspended graphene propagating plasmon waveguide device, including the steps of:
the method comprises the following steps: selecting a substrate, and preparing a hole structure on the substrate.
According to a preferred embodiment of the invention, the substrate is selected from silicon dioxide with a thickness of 300nm in combination with a 500 μm silicon wafer. And then manufacturing a plurality of pore structures on the substrate by using a mechanical processing, dry method or wet etching method, wherein the pore diameter of the pore structure is 0.5-5 cm, and the pore depth is 0.1-5 cm.
Further, the transverse section of the hole structure is in a shape of a circle, an ellipse, a triangle, a square, a rectangle, a pentagon structure, a regular hexagon and an octagon. The hole structure is a blind hole structure or a through hole structure, and the distance between the through holes is 1 mu m-4 cm; the longitudinal section of the hole structure is of a step-shaped structure.
Step two: preparing a graphene film;
step three: placing a graphene film on the substrate, and covering a pore structure to form a suspended graphene layer;
step four: preparing an electrode structure, namely preparing electrodes by using methods such as thermal evaporation, electron beam evaporation, focused ion deposition, magnetron sputtering and the like;
step five: doping the graphene layer by using a chemical doping method or point-of-sale doping by using an electrode grid voltage; wherein, the chemical doping method is to use nitric acid vapor or nitrogen dioxide gas.
Step six: exciting and characterizing plasmons in a near field; the plasmon is directly excited by scattered light of the needle point of the intermediate infrared scattering type scanning near-field optical microscope, or is excited by irradiating incident light to the boundary of a hole in a sample, and the interference pattern of the plasmon wave supported on the suspended graphene can be obtained by scanning the surface of the sample by using the needle point of the intermediate infrared scattering type scanning near-field optical microscope. The sample is the suspended graphene propagation plasmon waveguide device prepared in the first step to the fifth step.
The invention provides a propagation plasmon supported on a suspended graphene structure, which can effectively eliminate the dielectric loss of the graphene plasmon and reduce the attenuation rate of the plasmon. In addition, due to the fact that the dielectric constant of air is small, the plasmon wavelength on the suspended graphene is long (the wavelength can reach 800nm), and the characteristic of low attenuation (the attenuation rate is 1/20) is matched, so that the long-wavelength propagation distance (the boundary excitation transmission distance can reach 10 microns) can be achieved.
Other embodiments of the invention will be apparent to those skilled in the art from consideration of the specification and practice of the invention disclosed herein. It is intended that the specification and examples be considered as exemplary only, with a true scope and spirit of the invention being indicated by the following claims.