Plasmon excitations in graphitic carbon spheres

Thomas Stöckli, Jean-Marc Bonard, André Châtelain, Zhong Lin Wang, and Pierre Stadelmann
Phys. Rev. B 57, 15599 – Published 15 June 1998
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Abstract

Electron energy loss spectroscopy in a high-resolution transmission electron microscope has recently been used with success to characterize the electronic properties of closed cage nanometer-size graphitic particles. In the plasmon region, the experimental data reveal interesting size-dependent variations, which are not yet fully understood. The difficulties encountered in the interpretation of the spectra are principally due to the lack of a complete theoretical treatment of the anisotropic dielectric response in nanometer-size particles. In order to obtain a better understanding of the experimental data we propose a model based on nonrelativistic local dielectric response theory for electrons penetrating through a nested concentric-shell fullerene or the so-called “carbon onion.” The anisotropy of the electronic properties of the sphere is taken into account via the frequency-dependent dielectric tensor of graphite. The model can be applied to simulate electron energy loss spectra as well as line scans through energy filtered images and allows thus a direct comparison to experimental data.

  • Received 30 January 1998

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.57.15599

©1998 American Physical Society

Authors & Affiliations

Thomas Stöckli*, Jean-Marc Bonard, and André Châtelain

  • Institut de Physique Expérimentale, Département de Physique, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland

Zhong Lin Wang

  • School of Materials Science and Engineering, Georgia Institute of Technology, Atlanta, Georgia 30332-0245

Pierre Stadelmann

  • Centre Interdépartemental de Microscopie Electronique, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland

  • *Electronic address: thomas.stoeckli@ipe.dp.epfl.ch

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Issue

Vol. 57, Iss. 24 — 15 June 1998

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