Direct graphene growth on MgO: Origin of the band gap

A 2.5 monolayer (ML) thick graphene film grown by chemical vapor deposition of thermally dissociated C₂H₄ on MgO(111), displays a significant band gap. The apparent six-fold low energy electron diffraction (LEED) pattern actually consists of two three-fold patterns with different 'A' and 'B' site diffraction intensities. Similar effects are observed for the LEED patterns of a 1 ML carbon film derived from annealing adventitious carbon on MgO(111), and for a 1.5 ML thick graphene film grown by sputter deposition on the 1 ML film. The LEED data indicate different electron densities at the A and B sites of the graphene lattice, suggesting that the observed band gap results from lifting the graphene HOMO/LUMO degeneracy at the Dirac point. The data also indicate that disparities in A site/B site LEED intensities decrease with increasing carbon overlayer thickness, suggesting that the graphene band gap size decreases with increasing number of graphene layers on MgO(111).