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The ability to define an off state in logic electronics is the key ingredient that is impossible to fulfill using a conventional pristine graphene layer, due to the absence of an electronic bandgap. For years, this property has been the missing element for incorporating graphene into next-generation field effect transistors. In this work, we grow high-quality armchair graphene nanoribbons on the sidewalls of 6H-SiC mesa structures. Angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy (ARPES) and scanning tunneling spectroscopy measurements reveal the development of a width-dependent semiconducting gap driven by quantum confinement effects. Furthermore, ARPES demonstrates an ideal one-dimensional electronic behavior that is realized in a graphene-based environment, consisting of well-resolved subbands, dispersing and non-dispersing along and across the ribbons respectively. Our experimental findings, coupled with theoretical tight-binding calculations, set the grounds for a deeper exploration of quantum confinement phenomena and may open intriguing avenues for new low-power electronics.

Graphene was shown to reveal intriguing properties of its relativistic two-dimensional electron gas; however, its implementation to microelectronic applications is missing to date. In this work, we present a comprehensive study of epitaxial graphene on technologically relevant and in a standard CMOS process achievable Ge(100) epilayers grown on Si(100) substrates. Crystalline graphene monolayer structures were grown by means of chemical vapor deposition (CVD). Using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy and in situ surface transport measurements, we demonstrate their metallic character both in momentum and real space. Despite numerous crystalline imperfections, e.g., grain boundaries and strong corrugation, as compared to epitaxial graphene on SiC(0001), charge carrier mobilities of 1 × 10 4 cm 2 / Vs were obtained at room temperature, which is a result of the quasi-charge neutrality within the graphene monolayers on germanium and not dependent on the presence of an interface oxide. The interface roughness due to the facet structure of the Ge(100) epilayer, formed during the CVD growth of graphene, can be reduced via subsequent in situ annealing up to 850 °C coming along with an increase in the mobility by 30%. The formation of a Ge(100)−(2 × 1) structure demonstrates the weak interaction and effective delamination of graphene from the Ge/Si(100) substrate.

Protected and spin-polarized transport channels are the hallmark of topological insulators, coming along with an intrinsic strong spin−orbit coupling. Here we identified such corresponding chiral states in epitaxially grown zigzag graphene nanoribbons (zz-GNRs), albeit with an extremely weak spin−orbit interaction. While the bulk of the monolayer zz-GNR is fully suspended across a SiC facet, the lower edge merges into the SiC(0001) substrate and reveals a surface state at the Fermi energy, which is extended along the edge and splits in energy toward the bulk. All of the spectroscopic details are precisely described within a tight binding model incorporating a Haldane term and strain effects. The concomitant breaking of time-reversal symmetry without the application of external magnetic fields is supported by ballistic transport revealing a conduction of G = e 2 /h.