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Aharonov–Bohm interferences from local deformations in graphene

Nature Physics volume 7, pages 810–815 (2011)Cite this article

Abstract

One of the most interesting aspects of graphene is the close relation between its structural and electronic properties. The observation of ripples both in free-standing graphene and in samples on a substrate has given rise to active investigation of the membrane-like properties of graphene, and the origin of the ripples remains one of the most interesting open problems concerning this system. The interplay of structural and electronic properties is successfully described by the modelling of curvature and elastic deformations by fictitious gauge fields. These fields have become an experimental reality after the observation of the Landau levels that can form in graphene due to strain. Here we propose a device to detect microstresses in graphene based on a scanning-tunnelling-microscopy set-up able to measure Aharonov–Bohm interferences at the nanometre scale. The predicted interferences in the local density of states are created by the fictitious magnetic field associated with elastic deformations of the sample.

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Figure 1: Basic sketch of the proposed device.
Figure 2
Figure 3: Strain-induced pseudo magnetic fields and AB interferences in the LDOS.
Figure 4: Proposed STM interferometer for measuring the strain in suspended graphene.

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Acknowledgements

A.C. thanks J. M. Gómez-Rodríguez for inspiring discussions, without which this work would not have been initiated. We also thank R. Aguado, E. V. Castro, A. Geim, A. G. Grushin, F. Guinea and M. I. Katsnelson for useful comments on the manuscript. Support from MEC (Spain) through grants FIS2008-00124, PIB2010BZ-00512 and NSF grant No. DMR-1005035 is acknowledged.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana 47405, USA

    Fernando de Juan

  2. Departamento de Física Teórica, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, E-28049, Madrid, Spain

    Alberto Cortijo

  3. Instituto de Ciencia de Materiales de Madrid (CSIC), Sor Juana Inés de la Cruz 3, Madrid 28049, Spain

    María A. H. Vozmediano

  4. European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, 6 rue Jules Horowitz, BP 220, 38043 Grenoble, France

    Andrés Cano

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  1. Fernando de Juan
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All authors equally contributed to this work.

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Correspondence to María A. H. Vozmediano.

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de Juan, F., Cortijo, A., Vozmediano, M. et al. Aharonov–Bohm interferences from local deformations in graphene. Nature Phys 7, 810–815 (2011). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys2034

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