Karen McNulty Walsh

Brookhaven National Laboratory

Brookhaven National Laboratory Center for Functional Nanomaterials researchers Gwen Wright and Aaron Stein are at the electron beam lithography writer in the CFN cleanroom.

Nanomaterials That Self-Assemble

Researchers manufacture billionth-of-a-meter structures that snap together in complex patterns with unprecedented efficiency.

On the left is a schematic of a graphene field-effect-transistor used in this study. The device consists of a solar cell containing graphene stacked on top of a high-performance copper indium gallium diselenide (CIGS) semiconductor, which in turn is stacked on an industrial substrate (either soda-lime glass, SLG, or sodium-free borosilicate glass, BSG). The research revealed that the SLG substrate serves as a source of sodium doping, and improved device performance in a way not seen in the sodium-free substrate. On the right is a scanning electron micrograph of the device as seen from above, with the white scale bar measuring 10 microns, and a transmission electron micrograph inset of the CIGS/graphene interface where the white scale bar measures 100 nanometers.

Glass Used to Optimize Graphene

Graphene leans on glass to advance everything from flat screens to solar cells.