Fig. 1

Self-assembly of bianthracene precursors on copper(111). a Bottom-up fabrication of graphene nanoribbons via deposition of dibromo-biranthracene (Br₂BA) on a copper 111 (Cu(111)) surface. The molecules form chain-shaped ‘islands’ via self-assembly, which undergo a chemical reaction to form graphene nanoribbons upon heating⁵. The Cu(111) surface is in the plane of the page, but not shown explicitly. Bromine functional groups are indicated by the red circles. b Some typical islands formed at 200 K by various bianthracene molecules possessing different functional groups (as predicted by the GAMMA model¹¹). The percentages are probabilities of forming isolated chain-shaped islands. Functional groups are indicated by the red circles. Gray spheres = carbon, white spheres = hydrogen, red–brown spheres = bromine, and blue spheres = nitrogen atoms. All molecule structures were drawn in Materials Studio Visualizer²⁸