Extremely flat band in bilayer graphene.

Marchenko, D; Evtushinsky, D V; Golias, E; Varykhalov, A; Seyller, Th; Rader, O · Sci Adv · 2018

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

We propose a novel mechanism of flat band formation based on the relative biasing of only one sublattice against other sublattices in a honeycomb lattice bilayer. The mechanism allows modification of the band dispersion from parabolic to "Mexican hat"-like through the formation of a flattened band. The mechanism is well applicable for bilayer graphene-both doped and undoped. By angle-resolved photoemission from bilayer graphene on SiC, we demonstrate the possibility of realizing this extremely flattened band (< 2-meV dispersion), which extends two-dimensionally in a k-space area around the <math xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML"> <mrow> <mrow><mover><mi>K</mi> <mo>¯</mo></mover> </mrow> </mrow> </math> point and results in a disk-like constant energy cut. We argue that our two-dimensional flat band model and the experimental results have the potential to contribute to achieving superconductivity of graphene- or graphite-based systems at elevated temperatures.