The role of copper on the restoration of graphene oxide by chemical vapor deposition

High-quality reduced graphene oxide (rGO) sheets can be accessible through Langmuir-Blodgett self-assembly (LBSA) on copper foil and dielectric substrate under high temperature ethanol vapors via chemical vapor deposition (CVD) process. Through the LBSA forming method, a uniform and smooth graphene oxide (GO) film can be obtained on the target substrate, which is more economical and efficient compared to the traditional growth strategy. Moreover, the GO-derived graphene film repaired on copper was nearly defect-free with a negligible defect density (ID/IG ratio of <0.1) and manifested a strong 2D peak, indicating high efficiency of defects restoration. The obtained rGO sheets exhibited excellent electrical properties (1.2 kΩ/sq prepared on SiO2/Si, 0.2 kΩ/sq prepared on copper and subsequently transferred to SiO2/Si) that had surpassed other GO-derived graphene ever reported. Meanwhile, we demonstrate that Cu-vapor will degrade the restoration efficiency when introduced remotely, which is quite different from previous studies on graphene growth.