Facet-insensitive graphene growth on copper

Polycrystalline copper foils are surprisingly effective in chemical vapor deposition of graphene, although only Cu(111) facets possess the correct symmetry and low lattice mismatch. Density functional theory calculations of carbon on three copper facets show that, as the carbon cluster grows, the carbon-copper interaction weakens while the carbon-carbon interaction strengthens. At a significant distance away, and with negligible electron transfer from the substrate, large carbon clusters are blind to the atomic details of the copper substrates.