Energy dissipation in edged and edgeless graphene mechanical resonators

Abstract

We examined the temperature (T) dependence of the inverse of quality factors (Q−1) of edged and edgeless graphene resonators to evaluate energy dissipation in these resonators. We found that Q−1 in an edgeless drumhead resonator shows a linear T dependence in a wide range of 20–300 K, while that in an edged doubly clamped resonator shows T2 and T0.3 dependence above and below ∼100 K, respectively. On the basis of these experimental results, and by comparing them with the previous experimental and numerical studies, we discuss the energy dissipation mechanisms in these resonators. The dissipation at free edges causes the T0.3 dependence in the lower temperature regime, and tensile strain due to the thermal contraction of the clamped-end metal will lead to the T2 behavior in the higher temperature regime. We demonstrate that elimination of these dissipation sources provides wide-ranging linear-T dependence of Q−1 in our drumhead resonators.