Raman and morphology visualization in epitaxial graphene on 4H-SiC by Nitrogen or Argon ion irradiation

Graphene is a one-atom-thick planar sheet of carbon atoms that are densely packed into a honeycomb crystal lattice and is attracting tremendous interest since being discovered in 2004. Epitaxial growth of graphene on silicon carbide (SiC) is an effective method to obtain high quality layers. In this work, the effects of irradiation on epitaxial SiC/graphene were studied. The samples were irradiated with Nitrogen and Argon ions at an energy of 200 keV and different fluence with 4 × 1012 ions/cm2 to 1 × 1013 ions/cm2. The results of Raman measurements indicate that ion beam irradiation causes defects and disorder in the graphene crystal structure, and the level of defects increases with increasing ion fluence. Surface morphology images are obtained by atomic force microscope (AFM). This work is valuable for the potential application of epitaxial graphene on SiC in the field of optoelectronics devices.