Variability Effects in Graphene: Challenges and Opportunities for Device Engineering and Applications

TL;DR

This paper reviews the variability effects in graphene, highlighting their impact on device reliability, yield, and sensing applications, and discusses engineering strategies to mitigate or utilize these effects.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of graphene variability challenges and explores opportunities for device engineering and sensing applications.

Findings

Variability causes fluctuations in device performance.

Variability can be exploited for sensing applications.

Challenges in large-scale graphene device production.

Abstract

Variability effects in graphene can result from the surrounding environment and the graphene material itself, which form a critical issue in examining the feasibility of graphene devices for large-scale production. From the reliability and yield perspective, these variabilities cause fluctuations in the device performance, which should be minimized via device engineering. From the metrology perspective, however, the variability effects can function as novel probing mechanisms, in which the 'signal fluctuations' can be useful for potential sensing applications. This paper presents an overview of the variability effects in graphene, with emphasis on their challenges and opportunities for device engineering and applications. The discussion can extend to other thin-film, nanowire and nanotube devices with similar variability issues, forming general interest in evaluating the promise of emerging technologies.