Interaction driven metal-insulator transition in strained graphene

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The question of whether electron-electron interactions can drive a metal to insulator transition in graphene under realistic experimental conditions is addressed. Using three representative methods to calculate the effective long-range Coulomb interaction between π-electrons in graphene and solving for the ground state using quantum Monte Carlo methods, we argue that without strain, graphene remains metallic and changing the substrate from SiO₂ to suspended samples hardly makes any difference. In contrast, applying a rather large -- but experimentally realistic -- uniform and isotropic strain of about 15% seems to be a promising route to making graphene an antiferromagnetic Mott insulator.