Energy shift of collective electron excitations in highly corrugated graphitic nanostructures: Experimental and theoretical investigation

Abstract

Effect of corrugation of hexagonal carbon network on the collective electron excitations has been studied using optical absorption and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy in conjunction with density functional theory calculations. Onion-like carbon (OLC) was taken as a material, where graphitic mantle enveloping agglomerates of multi-shell fullerenes is strongly curved. Experiments showed that positions of π and π + σ plasmon modes as well as π → π* absorption peak are substantially redshifted for OLC as compared with those of highly ordered pyrolytic graphite and thermally exfoliated graphite consisted of planar sheets. This effect was reproduced in behavior of dielectric functions of rippled graphite models calculated within the random phase approximation. We conclude that the energy of electron excitations in graphitic materials could be precisely tuned by a simple bending of hexagonal network without change of topology. Moreover, our investigation suggests that in such materials optical exciton can transfer energy to plasmon non-radiatively.