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arXiv · 2512.06986

Remote epitaxial frustration

Taehwan Jung·Nicholas Hagopian·Anshu Sirohi·Quinn Campbell·Chengye Dong·Zachary T. LaDuca·Tamalika Samanta·Joshua Robinson·Paul M. Voyles·Jason K. Kawasaki
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Abstract

Remote epitaxy relaxes the constraints of conventional epitaxy, to enable low defect density, chemically abrupt heterostructures and exfoliation of single crystalline membranes. However, definitive evidence for a true remote mechanism remains elusive because most experiments can be explained by alternative mechanism that are macroscopically indistinguishable from true remote epitaxy. Using GdAuGe films grown on graphene/SiC (0001), we present two signatures that cannot be explained by the leading alternatives to the remote mechanism: (1) a few atomic layer thick disordered interlayer at the GdAuGe/graphene interface and (2) a $30\degree$ rotated epitaxial relationship between the GdAuGe film and the SiC substrate. Density functional theory calculations indicate these signatures arise from remote epitaxial \textit{frustration}, a competition amongst epitaxy to the remotely screened substrate, to graphene, and to the graphene-induced interfacial reconstruction. Tuning the amplitudes and periodicities of these competing potentials provides new opportunities to intentionally disrupt long-range order.

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Taehwan Jung, Nicholas Hagopian, Anshu Sirohi, Quinn Campbell, Chengye Dong, Zachary T. LaDuca, Tamalika Samanta, Joshua Robinson, Paul M. Voyles, Jason K. Kawasaki. 2025-12-07. Remote epitaxial frustration. https://arxiv.org/abs/2512.06986

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