Development of Low Cost Room Temperature STM for the Preliminary Analysis of 2D Materials and Twisted Graphene Bilayers

Scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) is a valuable tool for studying atomic positions, electronic energy properties of materials, and distributions of electrons at the surface of a material. Using 3D printing, we developed a cost-effective room temperature STM for the analysis of 2D materials. After noise reduction and calibration, we can examine Moiré patterns in CVD-grown twisted bilayer graphene to efficiently identify the relative angle between the bilayers. This work demonstrates how modern tunneling microscopes can be used as a cost-effective preliminary diagnostic tool for studying atomic positions and electronic superlattices at material surfaces.