Programmable high crystallinity carbon patterns

Carbon nanomaterials such as carbon nanotube and graphene are promising candidates for next-generation flexible electronics. However, the practical application of carbon electronics requires controlled fabrication of those materials with micro-patterned structures on flexible substrate at wafer-scale and low cost. Inspiring from the conventional photolithography process and pyrolysis of photoresist, herein, we demonstrate the synthesis of high-quality micro-patterned high crystallinity carbon. The method employed pre-patterned pyrolyzed photoresist as carbon precursors, in order to minimize the mobility of carbon during the high temperature growth, which results into high quality carbon patterns with a lateral resolution up to ~2 µm. The flexible carbon electronics are demonstrated by transferring the as-patterned high crystallinity carbon patterns to the flexible substrate, and showing asymmetric tensile-compressive response with high output resolution. These results will pave the way to the next-generation carbon-based flexible electronics and mechanical sensors.