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Science 18 April 2008:
Vol. 320. no. 5874, pp. 356 - 358
DOI: 10.1126/science.1154663
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Reports

Chaotic Dirac Billiard in Graphene Quantum Dots

L. A. Ponomarenko,1 F. Schedin,1 M. I. Katsnelson,2 R. Yang,1 E. W. Hill,1 K. S. Novoselov,1* A. K. Geim1

The exceptional electronic properties of graphene, with its charge carriers mimicking relativistic quantum particles and its formidable potential in various applications, have ensured a rapid growth of interest in this new material. We report on electron transport in quantum dot devices carved entirely from graphene. At large sizes (>100 nanometers), they behave as conventional single-electron transistors, exhibiting periodic Coulomb blockade peaks. For quantum dots smaller than 100 nanometers, the peaks become strongly nonperiodic, indicating a major contribution of quantum confinement. Random peak spacing and its statistics are well described by the theory of chaotic neutrino billiards. Short constrictions of only a few nanometers in width remain conductive and reveal a confinement gap of up to 0.5 electron volt, demonstrating the possibility of molecular-scale electronics based on graphene.

1 Manchester Centre for Mesoscience and Nanotechnology, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 9PL, UK.
2 Institute for Molecules and Materials, Radboud University Nijmegen, 6525 ED Nijmegen, Netherlands.

* To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: novoselov{at}manchester.ac.uk

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THIS ARTICLE HAS BEEN CITED BY OTHER ARTICLES:
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A. K. Geim (2009)
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M. Huang, H. Yan, C. Chen, D. Song, T. F. Heinz, and J. Hone (2009)
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