title: Fullerene growth from encapsulated graphene flakes.
abstract: The direct in situ observation of fullerene formation encapsulated within a graphene ridge has been made possible using an aberration corrected transmission electron microscope (AC-TEM). An atom-by-atom mechanism was proposed based on in situ AC-TEM observations. First principle calculations found a continuous energy decrease upon the addition of carbon atoms to the edge of the graphene flakes, which mimics the fullerene growth steps and supports the atom-by-atom mechanism. The ridged graphene structure worked as a container for pinning small graphene flakes and capturing carbon atoms, which increased the growth probability of the fullerene structure within the small encapsulated space.
authors.affiliation: SEU-FEI Nano Pico center, Key Laboratory of MEMS of Ministry of Education, School of Electronics Science and Engineering, Southeast University, Nanjing, 210096, P. R. China. slt@seu.edu.cn hqa@seu.edu.cn.
authors.forename: Wan
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Neng
authors.forename: Lei
authors.initials: L
authors.lastname: Shuang-ying
authors.forename: Xu
authors.initials: X
authors.lastname: Jun
authors.forename: Martini
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Matteo
authors.forename: Zhou
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Yi-long
authors.forename: Wan
authors.initials: W
authors.lastname: Shu
authors.forename: Sun
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Li-tao
authors.forename: Huang
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Qing-an