New type of charged defect in amorphous chalcogenides

We report on density-functional-based tight-binding simulations of a series of amorphous arsenic sulfide models. In addition to the charged coordination defects previously proposed to exist in chalcogenide glasses, a novel defect pair, As(4)](-)-S(3)](+), consisting of a fourfold coordinated arsenic site in a seesaw configuration and a threefold coordinated sulfur site in a near-planar trigonal configuration, was found in several models. The valence-alternation pairs S(3)](+)-S-1 are converted into As(4)](-)-S(3)](+) pairs under HOMO-to-LUMO electronic excitation. This structural transformation is accompanied by a decrease in the size of the HOMO-LUMO band gap, which suggests that such transformations could contribute to photodarkening in these materials.