Publication Type
Journal
Journal Name
Physical Review Letters
Publication Date
Page Number
035406
Volume
85
Issue
3
Abstract
The interaction of water with graphitic carbon at the atomic scale is studied as a function of the hydrophobicity of epitaxial graphene. High resolution X-ray reflectivity combined with both classical and ab initio molecular dynamics simulations allows us to understand how the graphene-water interface changes as the hydrophobicity of intrinsic multilayer graphene (contact angle θc = 93°) is reduced by the presence of substrate and surface defect sites, leading to increased hydrophilicity (θc = 73°) for zero-layer graphene (i.e., the epitaxial buffer layer). The relationship between water depletion and hydrophobicity (i.e., the hydrophobic gap) is also clarified by the current findings.
