"Inside Out" Growth Method for High-Quality Nitrogen-Doped Graphene

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel 'Inside Out' growth method for producing high-quality nitrogen-doped graphene on nickel, combining experimental and theoretical analysis to understand atomic configurations, with potential applications in catalysis and energy devices.

Contribution

The study presents a scalable growth technique for nitrogen-doped graphene that integrates experimental characterization and density functional theory to elucidate atomic structures.

Findings

Successful synthesis of flat, continuous nitrogen-doped graphene layers.

Atomic-scale understanding of nitrogen configurations in graphene.

Potential for high-performance nano-devices and catalytic applications.

Abstract

High-quality nitrogen-doped graphene on nickel is prepared by exploiting both the catalytic properties of nickel and the solubility of nitrogen atoms into its bulk. Following the standard chemical vapor deposition procedure, a previously nitrogen-doped nickel substrate is exposed to carbon-containing precursors so that nitrogen atoms, segregating to the surface, remain trapped in the growing graphene network. Morphological and chemical characterization by scanning tunneling microscopy and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy demonstrates that the process yields a flat, wide, continuous nitrogen-doped graphene layer. Experimental results are combined with a thorough density functional theory investigation of possible structural models, to obtain a clear description at the atomic scale of the various configurations of the nitrogen atoms observed in the graphene mesh. This growth method is potentially scalable and suitable for the production of high-performance nano-devices with well-defined nitrogen centers, to be exploited as metal-free carbon-based catalysts in several applicative fields such as electrochemistry, energy storage, gas storage/sensing or wastewater treatment.