Purely Armchair or Partially Chiral: Noncontact Atomic Force Microscopy Characterization of Dibromo-Bianthryl-Based Graphene Nanoribbons Grown on Cu(111)

Carlos Sánchez-Sánchez; Thomas Dienel; Okan Deniz; Pascal Ruffieux; Reinhard Berger; Xinliang Feng; Klaus Müllen; Roman Fasel

doi:10.1021/acsnano.6b04025

Purely Armchair or Partially Chiral: Noncontact Atomic Force Microscopy Characterization of Dibromo-Bianthryl-Based Graphene Nanoribbons Grown on Cu(111)

ACS Nano. 2016 Aug 23;10(8):8006-11. doi: 10.1021/acsnano.6b04025. Epub 2016 Jul 22.

Authors

Carlos Sánchez-Sánchez¹, Thomas Dienel¹, Okan Deniz¹, Pascal Ruffieux¹, Reinhard Berger², Xinliang Feng², Klaus Müllen³, Roman Fasel^{1

4}

Affiliations

¹ Empa, Swiss Federal Laboratories for Materials Science and Technology , Überlandstrasse 129, CH-8600 Dübendorf, Switzerland.
² Center for Advancing Electronics Dresden (cfaed) and Department of Chemistry and Food Chemistry, Technische Universität Dresden , D-01062 Dresden, Germany.
³ Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research , D-55128 Mainz, Germany.
⁴ Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, University of Bern , Freiestrasse 3, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland.

PMID: 27428831
DOI: 10.1021/acsnano.6b04025

Abstract

We report on the atomic structure of graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) formed via on-surface synthesis from 10,10'-dibromo-9,9'-bianthryl (DBBA) precursors on Cu(111). By means of ultrahigh vacuum noncontact atomic force microscopy with CO-functionalized tips we unveil the chiral nature of the so-formed GNRs, a structure that has been under considerable debate. Furthermore, we prove that-in this particular case-the coupling selectivity usually introduced by halogen substitution is overruled by the structural and catalytic properties of the substrate. Specifically, we show that identical chiral GNRs are obtained from 9,9'-bianthryl, the unsubstituted sister molecule of DBBA.

Keywords: armchair; bottom-up; chiral; functionalized tip; graphene nanoribbons; on-surface synthesis.

Publication types

Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't