Nanotextures from orthogonal graphene ribbons: Thermal stability evaluation

Abstract

In the present paper, the thermal stability of the nanotextures formed from the same-sized weft and warp graphene ribbons were examined by molecular dynamics simulations. It was found that graphene ribbons existed in a nanotexture had relative sliding, rotating and bending movements at room temperature. Due to asynchronous motion, the initially parallel ribbons (either weft or warp ribbons) became curved and a part of neighboring ribbons were found to be attached together, consequently, the obtained nanotexture became wrinkled and lost its stability. Moreover, the wrinkle direction was aligned with one of the diagonals of the square nanotexture. It was noticed that nanotextures formed from zigzag ribbons were thermally shrunk at higher temperatures, whereas, the nanotextures obtained from armchair ribbons manifested thermal expansion properties. Furthermore, nanotextures formed from ribbons wider than 0.7 nm were thermally stability at room temperature.