Dirac cones for bi- and trilayer Bernal-stacked graphene in a quantum graph model

Abstract

Abstract A quantum graph model for a single sheet of graphene is extended to bilayer and trilayer Bernal-stacked graphene; the spectra are characterized and the dispersion relations explicitly obtained; Dirac cones are then proven to be present only for trilayer graphene, although the bilayer has a gapless parabolic band component. Our model rigorously exhibits basic facts from tight-binding calculations, effective two-dimensional models and a π-orbital continuum model with nearest-neighbour tunnelling that have been discussed in the physics literature.