On‐Surface Synthesis of a Nitrogen‐Doped Graphene Nanoribbon with Multiple Substitutional Sites
Yong Zhang, Jianchen Lu, Yang Li, Baijin Li, Zilin Ruan, Hui Zhang, Zhenliang Hao, Shijie Sun, Wei Xiong, Lei Gao, Long Chen, Jinming Cai
Abstract
Abstract Doped graphene nanoribbons (GNRs) with heteroatoms are a principal strategy to fine‐tune the electronic structures of GNRs for future device applications. Here, we successfully synthesized the N=9 nitrogen‐doped armchair GNR on the Au(111) surface. Due to the flexibility of precursor molecules, three different covalent bonds (C−C, C−N, N−N) are formed in the GNR backbone. Scanning tunneling spectroscopy analysis together with band structure calculations reveals that the band gap of the N‐9‐AGNRs (C−C) will be enlarged compared to pristine 9‐AGNRs, and the C−N bond and N−N bond at the isolated site of N‐9‐AGNR (C−C) will introduce new defect states near the Fermi level. DFT calculations reveal that the electronic structure of N‐9‐AGNR (C−C) shows semiconductor character, while N‐9‐AGNR (C−N) and N‐9‐AGNR (N−N) display metallic character. Our results provide a promising route for creating more complex molecular heterostructures with tunable band gaps, which may be useful for future molecular electronics and memory device applications.