The Rise of Graphene — TEI-tagged view

A. K. Geim, K. S. Novoselov · 2007 · materials-science · doi:10.1038/nmat1849 · TEI xml · tagged edition · index · concepts · authors
Where this record's text came from. faceted 2026-08 by reading the locally held text (pdftext); every evidence string verified as an exact substring of that text before merging. Claim type is 'existence' because the review's organising claim is that a material long held not to exist (a free-standing 2D crystal) does exist and is of high crystal quality; the piece is nevertheless a review rather than a primary report, hence method=review. Only one claim_relation is recorded: the Landau/Peierls contradiction is the one place the paper names prior work and positions its own subject matter against it (section heading 'MATERIALS THAT SHOULD NOT EXIST'). Mermin is named only as extending Landau's argument, not as a relation to this paper, so it is not recorded. Replication status='replicated' rests on the paper's own statement that 'the follow-up experiments9,10 confirmed that its charge carriers were indeed massless Dirac fermions'; note the paper also reports partial non-replication of the isolation technique by other groups ('only graphite flakes 20 to 100 layers thick were found') and an unresolved quantitative disagreement over minimum conductivity ('the mystery of a missing pie'), whose surrounding sentence is too garbled by PDF extraction to quote as a limitation. 2026-08-15 and 2026-08-25 schema-0.3 passes: every quote verified as an exact substring of the staged text and anchored at merge time; concept terms verified present; every edge endpoint an existing node.
The quality of the text these quotes were cut from. corrupt-text-layer: the arXiv PDF extraction drops the letter c (lo alized, Dira, ex ept); not fixable by re-processing and no clean OA alternative found. Not enriched.
This record’s own method is review, and the tags below follow from that. A review’s findings, quantities and statistics are things stated IN this paper, and some of them report results obtained elsewhere. No tag on this page names a different author. Measured across every review in this corpus, 81% of a review’s tags carry no citation at all — most of them are the review speaking. The corpus does not adjudicate the rest: read an unmarked tag as a claim this paper makes, not necessarily one it made first.
Other fields define these differently the same word, defined another way in another discipline
graphene 2 fields
Tags on this paper every tag the record carries, whether or not the words occur in the text below — a number is how many papers in the corpus carry that tag; a tag with no number is unique to this paper
graphene6 Dirac fermion2 two-dimensional material2 quantum Hall effect2 pseudospin2 chirality5 massless Dirac fermions2 Fermi velocity zero-gap semiconductor zero-overlap semimetals real spin Berry’s phase Dirac equation2 Schrödinger equation massive Dirac fermions review319

Our tag layer for this paper

Cross-disciplinary analysis
content-tags & facets: phenomenon · claim-type · cross-domain-transfer · mechanism · claim-relation · replication-status · limitation — grounded in the full text
phenomenongraphene (two-dimensional atomic crystals)— “Graphene is the name given to a flat monolayer of carbon atoms tightly packed into a two-dimensional (2D) honeycomb lattice, and is a basic building block for graphitic materials of all other dimensionalities (Figure 1).”
claim-typeexistence— “Without such a 3D base, 2D materials were presumed not to exist until 2004, when the common wisdom was flaunted by the experimental discovery of graphene7 and other free-standing 2D atomic crystals (for example, single-layer boron nitride and half-layer BSCCO)8.”
method — evidence— “Before reviewing the earlier work on graphene, it is useful to define what 2D crystals are.”
transferfrom quantum electrodynamics: the concept of chirality - a projection of pseudospin onto momentum - carried over from relativistic quantum field theory to describe graphene's charge carriers— “By analogy with QED, one can also introduce a quantity called chirality6 that is formally a projection of σr on r and is positive (negative) for electrons (holes).”transfers[0]
mechanismthe analogy carries a conversion factor Because QED effects scale inversely with the speed of light, replacing c by the Fermi velocity enhances them in graphene by about 300.— “QED-specific phenomena are often inversely proportional to the speed of light c and, therefore, enhanced in graphene by a factor c/vF ≈300”mechanisms[0]
mechanismlayer count decides which theory applies The electronic structure evolves with layer number and reaches the 3D graphite limit at about ten layers, which makes the 2D/3D boundary operational rather than stipulated.— “It was shown that the electronic structure rapidly evolves with the number of layers, approaching the 3D limit of graphite already at 10 layers”mechanisms[1]
contradicts Landau's and Peierls' argument that strictly two-dimensional crystals are thermodynamically unstable and cannot exist— “More than 70 years ago, Landau and Peierls argued that strictly two-dimensional (2D) crystals were thermodynamically unstable and could not exist11,12. Their theory pointed out that a divergent contribution of thermal fluctuations in low-dimensional crystal lattices should lead to such displacements of atoms that they become comparable to…claim_relations[0]
reinterprets the categorical boundary between a 2D crystal and a thin 3D film— “This allows one to distinguish between single-, double- and few- (3 to <10) layer graphene as three different types of 2D crystals”claim_relations[1]
sensepseudospin - an index over the two carbon sublattices A and B, named after the QED spin index it resembles and explicitly NOT the electron's real spin— “which is similar to the spin index (up and down) in QED and, therefore, is referred to as pseudospin”senses[0]
sensechirality - here the projection of the pseudospin on the direction of motion, introduced by declared analogy with QED rather than derived— “By analogy with QED, one can also introduce a quantity called chirality6 that is formally a projection of σr on r and is positive (negative) for electrons (holes). In essence, chirality in graphene the direction of motion k signifies the fact that k electron and -k hole states are intricately connected by originating from the same carbon…senses[1]
sensemassless Dirac fermions - quasiparticles describable EITHER as electrons that lost their rest mass OR as neutrinos that gained the electron charge; the paper offers both framings and picks neither— “These quasiparticles, called massless Dirac fermions, can be seen as electrons that lost their rest mass m0 or as neutrinos that acquired the electron charge”senses[2]
sensehalf-integer quantum Hall effect - a name coined to mark that the effect belongs to NEITHER existing category: not a new fractional QHE, not the standard integer one— “This QHE has been dubbed “half-integer” to reflect both the shift and the fact that, although it is not a new fractional QHE, it is not the standard integer QHE either”senses[3]
sensespeed of light - in graphene's Dirac-like Hamiltonian the role is played by the Fermi velocity, about 300 times smaller— “the k-independent Fermi velocity vF plays the role of the speed of light”senses[4]
notethe categorical boundary between a 2D crystal and a thin 3D film — The paper replaces a stipulated boundary with a measured one and then divides the resulting class into three, on the same criterion.— “This allows one to distinguish between single-, double- and few- (3 to <10) layer graphene as three different types of 2D crystals”claim_relations[1]
notepseudospin —distinct-from→ real spin — AND THE PAPER IMMEDIATELY FENCES THE BORROWED WORD OFF FROM THE ONE IT CAME FROM: the symbol refers to pseudospin RATHER THAN the real spin of electrons. Borrowing the name and denying the identity, in the same paragraph.— “refers to pseudospin rather than the real spin of electrons”concept_edges[1]
weightpseudospin —distinct-from→ real spin — 0.9— “refers to pseudospin rather than the real spin of electrons”concept_edges[1]
notezero-gap semiconductor —same-as→ zero-overlap semimetals — An explicit in-text renaming: CAN ALSO BE REFERRED TO AS. Two vocabularies, one class, and the paper declines to choose between them.— “they are both zero-gap semiconductors (can also be referred to as zero-overlap semimetals) with one type of electrons and one type of holes”concept_edges[4]
weightzero-gap semiconductor —same-as→ zero-overlap semimetals — 0.8— “they are both zero-gap semiconductors (can also be referred to as zero-overlap semimetals) with one type of electrons and one type of holes”concept_edges[4]
differs inDirac equation —contrasted-with→ Schrödinger equation — which equation the material's carriers are naturally described by - the paper makes graphene the exception to the rule it states in the same sentence— “In condensed matter physics, the Schrödinger equation rules the world, usually being quite sufficient to describe electronic properties of materials. Graphene is an exception: Its charge carriers mimic relativistic particles and are easier and more natural to describe starting with the Dirac equation rather than the Schrödinger equation”concept_edges[5]
weightDirac equation —contrasted-with→ Schrödinger equation — 0.9— “In condensed matter physics, the Schrödinger equation rules the world, usually being quite sufficient to describe electronic properties of materials. Graphene is an exception: Its charge carriers mimic relativistic particles and are easier and more natural to describe starting with the Dirac equation rather than the Schrödinger equation”concept_edges[5]
differs inmassive Dirac fermions —contrasted-with→ massless Dirac fermions — rest mass - and the paper records that the borrowed framework CANNOT HOLD the combination— “Chiral quantum Hall effects. a, The hallmark of massless Dirac fermions is QHE plateaux in σxy at half integers of 4e2/h (adapted from ref. 9). b, Anomalous QHE for massive Dirac fermions in bilayer graphene is more subtle (red curve55): σxy exhibits the standard QHE sequence with plateaux at all integer N of 4e2/h except for N=0.”— “Such massive chiral particles would be an oxymoron in relativistic quantum theory”concept_edges[6]
weightmassive Dirac fermions —contrasted-with→ massless Dirac fermions — 0.9— “Chiral quantum Hall effects. a, The hallmark of massless Dirac fermions is QHE plateaux in σxy at half integers of 4e2/h (adapted from ref. 9). b, Anomalous QHE for massive Dirac fermions in bilayer graphene is more subtle (red curve55): σxy exhibits the standard QHE sequence with plateaux at all integer N of 4e2/h except for N=0.”concept_edges[6]
evidence status noteconcept — THE TERM IS NOT IN THE QUOTE - the massive chiral particles of the quote are the massive Dirac fermions that the next sentence names ('Landau quantization of “massive Dirac fermions”'); that sentence is not quoted because its formula did not survive text extraction.— “Such massive chiral particles would be an oxymoron in relativistic quantum theory”concepts[14]
for which uselimitation — the coverage of the review: AT THIS TIME, NO REVIEW CAN POSSIBLY BE COMPLETE— “This is to say that, at this time, no review can possibly be complete.”limitations[0]
for which uselimitation — the phenomena surveyed: DUE TO SPACE LIMITATIONS, WE DO NOT ATTEMPT TO OVERVIEW A WIDE RANGE OF OTHER INTERESTING PHENOMENA PREDICTED ... BUT AS YET NOT OBSERVED— “Due to space limitations, we do not attempt to overview a wide range of other interesting phenomena predicted for graphene theoretically but as yet not observed experimentally.”limitations[1]
for which uselimitation — the maturity of every conclusion: ONLY THE VERY TIP OF THE ICEBERG HAS BEEN UNCOVERED SO FAR, two years after graphene was first reported— “It has been just over 2 years since graphene was first reported and, despite remarkably rapid progress, only the very tip of the iceberg has been uncovered so far.”limitations[2]
replicationreplicated
limitationThe authors say the field is too new and too little published for any review to be complete.— “This is to say that, at this time, no review can possibly be complete.”limitations[0]
limitationPredicted but not-yet-observed graphene phenomena are excluded for reasons of space.— “Due to space limitations, we do not attempt to overview a wide range of other interesting phenomena predicted for graphene theoretically but as yet not observed experimentally.”limitations[1]
limitationOnly a small fraction of the subject has been explored at the time of writing.— “It has been just over 2 years since graphene was first reported and, despite remarkably rapid progress, only the very tip of the iceberg has been uncovered so far.”limitations[2]
limitationThe relativistic vocabulary is a description, not a claim about the physics - the paper says so itself while adopting it.limitations[3]
limitationA zero gap does not by itself imply Dirac fermions; the paper states the exception to its own diagnostic.limitations[4]
limitationThe half-integer QHE has a second, independent explanation via Berry's phase, which the paper reports without adjudicating.limitations[5]
Concepts
terms this paper carries, each with the sentence it was cut from — the layer that joins one paper to another. Terms with no quote yet are on CONCEPTS.html.
conceptpseudospin
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[4]
conceptchirality
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[5]
conceptmassless Dirac fermions
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[6]
conceptFermi velocity
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[7]
conceptzero-gap semiconductor
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[8]
conceptzero-overlap semimetals
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[9]
conceptreal spin
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[10]
conceptBerry’s phase
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[11]
conceptDirac equation
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[12]
conceptSchrödinger equation
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[13]
conceptmassive Dirac fermions
Quotation withheld — this paper is not ours to reproduce, and the page has already quoted as much of it as the rights layer allows. The tag, its field and its confidence stand; the sentence is at the publisher.
concepts[14]

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