The role of hydrogen partial pressure on the annealing of copper substrates for graphene CVD synthesis

The influence of hydrogen utilized during the thermal treatment of copper substrates on the subsequent graphene growth is investigated. It is known that various parameters such as nature of the carbon precursor, temperature and pressure strongly affect the quality of the graphene grown by chemical vapor deposition. Another important parameter is the hydrogen partial pressure adjusted during the growth stage and in the pre-growth annealing of the substrate. In attempts to elucidate the role of hydrogen assisted thermal annealing on the copper substrate morphology and on the subsequent graphene growth, we subjected Cu foils to thermal annealing under H2 atmosphere at different pressures. The copper surface was characterized by scanning electronic microscopy (SEM) and atomic force microscopy whereas graphene films and grains were characterized by Raman spectroscopy and SEM. Our findings suggest that hydrogen not only affect the Cu surface but also diffuses into the substrate, being stored in the bulk material during the thermal treatment of the substrate. The release of hydrogen species in the subsequent stages of growth can result in damage to the graphene layer or induce the nucleation of additional layers depending on the growth and pre-growth conditions. Therefore, the use of hydrogen during the annealing of 'low purity Cu foils' should be carefully planned in order to obtain high quality graphene via LPCVD.