Scanning tunneling microscopy, on atomic scale and larger, was used to study the surface structure of highly oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG), pyrolytic graphite (PG), benzene-derived graphite (BDG), and triphenylene-derived graphite. Good registry of the (0001) surface of PG and BDG was determined by comparison with HOPG. Using a large-scale scan (1 μm), steps, crystallite sizes, and other large features were compared. Highly symmetric hexagonal etch pits a few hundred nm in width and tens of nm deep, representing the nm scale effects of oxidation, were observed on the surface of BDG.
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Lorraine M. Siperko (1991) studied this question.