Precision X-ray measurement of the position sensitivity of graphene field effect transistors

We have been exploring the graphene field-effect transistor (GFET) as a platform for detection of ionizing radiation, whereby the detection is achieved indirectly by use of the field effect in graphene, which is induced by the generation and transport of ionized charge carriers in the underlying undoped semiconductor substrate. An important characteristic of such a detector is scalability to large areas. Previous experimental studies suggest that the effective area significantly exceeds the size of graphene for field effect-based architectures, and this is also predicted from the operational principle of these devices. We describe the results of the experimental studies of GFETs on silicon carbide (SiC) substrates by use a microbeam X-ray facility, provided by the Advanced Photon Source at Argonne National Laboratory. The results confirm that the effective area of the GFET is significantly larger than that of graphene with response measured at distances as large as 1000 μm from 10-μm size graphene. A simple transport model has been developed and is used to explain the spatial dependence of the GFET response.