Low-Temperature Reduction of Graphene Oxide: Electrical Conductance and Scanning Kelvin Probe Force Microscopy.

Graphene oxide (GO) films were formed by drop-casting method and were studied by FTIR spectroscopy, micro-Raman spectroscopy (mRS), X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy (XPS), four-points probe method, atomic force microscopy (AFM), and scanning Kelvin probe force (SKPFM) microscopy after low-temperature annealing at ambient conditions. It was shown that in temperature range from 50 to 250 °C the electrical resistivity of the GO films decreases by seven orders of magnitude and is governed by two processes with activation energies of 6.22 and 1.

Single electron transistors with hydrogen treatment of ALD SiO in nanoscale metal-insulator-metal tunnel junctions.

Over the past five years, fabrication of metal-insulator-metal (MIM) single electron transistors (SET) featuring atomic layer deposition (ALD) of ultrathin tunnel barrier dielectrics (SiO, AlO) has been reported. However, the performance of fabricated devices was significantly compromised by the presence of native metal oxide and problems associated with the nucleation of ALD dielectrics on metal substrates. To overcome the difficulty of dielectric ALD nucleation on metal substrates, we recently developed a fabrication technique in which the native metal oxide naturally forming in the presence of the ALD oxidant precursor is first used to promote the nucleation of ALD dielectrics, and then is chemically reduced by forming gas anneal (FGA) at temperatures near 400 °C.