Relaxation dynamics in epitaxial graphene probed at low excitation energies

The relaxation dynamics of graphene has been investigated in various degenerate as well as two-color pump-probe studies at excitation energies E = 1.6 eV [1-5]. We report on degenerate pump-probe spectroscopy at much lower energies (E = 20 – 250 meV; radiation source: free-electron laser) on graphene multilayers grown by thermal decomposition. Relaxation times between 20 and 40 ps are found for photon energies E < 70 meV, where only acoustic phonons can contribute to the relaxation dynamics. At 245 meV a much faster relaxation with two time constants (tau_1 ≈ 1.2 ps, tau_2 = 4 – 8 ps) is observed and attributed to contributions of optical phonons. While the pump-induced transmission is positive for E > 30 meV, pump-induced absorption occurred for E < 20 meV (Fig. 1). The increased transmission for E > 30 meV is caused by bleaching of the interband transition. We attribute the induced absorption to heating of carriers by intraband free-carrier absorption for E < 2E_F (E_F: Fermi energy).
[1] J.M. Dawlaty et al., Appl. Phys. Lett. 92, 042116 (2008).
[2] D. Song et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 101, 157402 (2008).
[3] P.A. George et al., Nano Lett. 8 ,4248 (2008).
[4] H. Wang et al., Appl. Phys. Lett., 96, 081917 (2010).
[5] D. Sun et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 104, 136802 (2010).