Atomic layer deposition of h-BN(0001) multilayers on Ni(111) and chemical vapor deposition of graphene on h-BN(0001)/Ni(111)

In situ direct, epitaxial growth of multilayers of hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) and graphene without physical transfer is of significant interest for the scalable production of graphene/h-BN heterostructures for device applications. Deposition on magnetic substrates is of particular interest for spin tunneling applications. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy and low energy electron diffraction demonstrate epitaxial atomic-layer deposition (ALD) of multilayer h-BN(0001) on Ni(111) and subsequent deposition of azimuthally-aligned multilayer graphene on h-BN(0001)/Ni(111) by chemical vapor deposition. Boron nitride ALD was accomplished with alternating cycles of BCl3/NH3 at a 600 K substrate temperature, and subsequent annealing in ultrahigh vacuum. Subsequent deposition of graphene was achieved by chemical vapor deposition using ethylene (CH2CH2) at 1000 K.