Drop-casted self-assembling graphene oxide membranes for scanning electron microscopy on wet and dense gaseous samples

ACS Nano. 2011 Dec 27;5(12):10047-54. doi: 10.1021/nn204287g. Epub 2011 Nov 29.

Abstract

Graphene oxide sheets dispersed in water and many other solvents can spontaneously assemble into a surface film covering an evaporating droplet due to their amphiphilicity. Thus, graphene oxide membranes with controllable thickness suspended over an orifice have been directly fabricated using a simple drop-cast approach. Mechanical properties and electron transparency tests of these membranes show their use as electron transparent, but molecularly impenetrable, windows for environmental electron microscopy in liquids and dense gaseous media. The foreseeable, broader application of this drop-cast window methodology is the creation of access spots for electron probes to study isolated microsamples in their natural, undisrupted state within the interior of prefabricated devices (such as microfluidic chips or sealed containers of biological, chemically reactive, toxic, or forensic materials).

Publication types

  • Research Support, Non-U.S. Gov't
  • Research Support, U.S. Gov't, Non-P.H.S.

MeSH terms

  • Crystallization / methods
  • Gases / analysis*
  • Gases / chemistry*
  • Graphite / chemistry*
  • Materials Testing / methods*
  • Membranes, Artificial*
  • Microscopy, Electron, Scanning / methods*
  • Molecular Probe Techniques*
  • Oxides / chemistry

Substances

  • Gases
  • Membranes, Artificial
  • Oxides
  • Graphite