Metallic behavior and enhanced adsorption energy of graphene on BN layer induced by Cu(111) substrate

We have investigated the adsorption properties and the electronic structure of graphene/BN and graphene/BN/Cu(111) systems by using van der Waals density functional theory. The ground-state adsorption site of graphene on BN/Cu(111) is found to be the same as that of graphene/BN. The Cu(111) substrate did not induce a significant change in the geometrical feature of graphene/BN. However, the adsorption energy of graphene on BN/Cu(111) is observed to be enhanced due to the Cu(111) substrate. In addition, we have found that the graphene layer displays a weak metallic character in graphene/BN/Cu(111) whereas an energy band gap is observed in the graphene in the graphene/BN bilayer system. Therefore, we have found that the metallic Cu(111) substrate affects the electronic structure and adsorption properties of graphene on BN/Cu(111), although it has no significant effect on the geometrical features.