Correction: Ab initio study of anisotropic mechanical and electronic properties of strained carbon-nitride nanosheet with interlayer bonding

The magnetic and electronic properties of strontium titanate with different carbon dopant configurations are explored using first-principles calculations with a generalized gradient approximation (GGA) and the GGA+U approach. Our results show that the structural stability, electronic properties and magnetic properties of C-doped SrTiCO₃ strongly depend on the distance between carbon dopants. In both GGA and GGA+U calculations, the doping structure is mostly stable with a nonmagnetic feature when the carbon dopants are nearest neighbors, which can be ascribed to the formation of a C-C dimer pair accompanied by stronger C-C and weaker C-Ti hybridizations as the C-C distance becomes smaller. As the C-C distance increases, C-doped SrTiCO₃ changes from an n-type nonmagnetic metal to ferromagnetic/antiferromagnetic half-metal and to an antiferromagnetic/ferromagnetic semiconductor in GGA calculations, while it changes from a nonmagnetic semiconductor to ferromagnetic half-metal and to an antiferromagnetic semiconductor using the GGA+U method. Our work demonstrates the possibility of tailoring the magnetic and electronic properties of C-doped SrTiO₃, which might provide some guidance to extend the applications of strontium titanate as a magnetic or optoelectronic material.

     

Ab initio investigation on mechanical properties of copper

Employing the ab initio total energy method based on the density functional theory with the generalized gradient approximation, we have investigated the theoretical mechanical properties of copper (Cu) systematically. The theoretical tensile strengths are calculated to be 25.3 GPa, 5.9 GPa, and 37.6 GPa for the fcc Cu single crystal in the [001], [110], and [111] directions, respectively. Among the three directions, the [110] direction is the weakest one due to the occurrence of structure transition at the lower strain and the weakest interaction of atoms between the (110) planes, while the [111] direction is the strongest direction because of the strongest interaction of atoms between the (111) planes. In terms of the elastic constants of Cu single crystal, we also estimate some mechanical quantities of polycrystalline Cu, including bulk modulus B, shear modulus G, Young's modulus E_p, and Poisson's ratio ν.     

Ab initio study of the electronic structure and elastic properties of Al5C3N

We investigate the electronic structure, chemical bonding and elastic properties of the hexagonal aluminum carbonitride, Al₅C₃N, by ab initio calculations. Al₅C₃N is a semiconductor with a narrow indirect gap of 0.81 eV. The valence bands below the Fermi level (E_F) originate from the hybridized Al p-C p and Al p-N p states. The calculated bulk and Young's moduli are 201 GPa and 292 GPa, which are slightly lower than those of Ti₃SiC₂. The values of the bulk-to-shear-modulus and bulk-modulus-to-c44 are 1.73 and 1.97, respectively, which are higher than those of Ti₂AlC and Ti2AlN, indicating that Al₅C₃N is a ductile ceramic.     

Ab initio study on magnetoelectric and electronic properties in Pb2TiVO6

First principles calculations within the projected augmented-wave (PAW) method, using the local spin density approximation plus U (LSDA+U) scheme, show that the tetragonal Pb2TiVO6 is a potential multiferroic material with antiferromagnetic (AFM) spin configuration. It has a magnetic moment of 1 μB in a one unit cell originating from the non-bonding orbital dxy in a majority spin channel and a band gap of 1.45 eV with proper U. The large BEC (Born effective charge) of Pb and Ti shows that the stereochemical activity of Pb and Ti may provide the possibility of switchable paths for the ferroelectricity in this hypothetical material. The insulating property and the lower resistivity in the recent prepared PbVO3 can be significantly improved by adopting the Ti.     

Ab initio study on phase transition and magnetism of BiFeO3 under pressure

In this paper the first-principles calculations within local spin density approximation (LSDA)+U show that BiFeO3 experiences a mixed phase state with P4mm structure being the intermediate phase before the pressure of phase transition is reached. The critical pressure for the insulator-metal transition (IMT) is found to be about 50 GPa. A pressure induced crossover of high-spin states and low-spin states is observed close to the IMT pressure in R3c structure. The LSDA+U calculations account well for the mechanism of the IMT and crossover of spin states predicted in recent experiment (Ref.[1]).     

Ab initio molecular dynamics investigations of structural, electronic and dynamical properties of water in supercritical carbon dioxide

Ab initio molecular dynamics simulations of a solitary perdeuterated water molecule solvated in supercritical carbon dioxide have been performed along an isotherm at three different densities. Electron donor-acceptor interactions between the oxygen atom of water and the carbon atom of CO₂ as well as hydrogen bonded interactions between the two molecules have been shown to play a dominant role in the solvation. The mean dipole moment of the water molecule increases with the density of the solution, from a value of 1.85 D at low density to around 2.15 D at the highest density. The increase in the solvent density causes the water molecule to exhibit a range of behavior, from a free molecule to one that interacts strongly with CO₂. A blue shift in the bending mode of water has been observed with increasing solvent density. The carbon dioxide molecules which are present in the first neighbor shell of water are found to exhibit larger propensity to deviate from a linear geometry in their instantaneous configurations.      

Ab initio calculations of the elastic, electronic, optical, and vibrational properties of PdGa compound under pressure

The structural, elastic, electronic, optical, and vibrational properties of cubic PdGa compound are investigated using the norm-conserving pseudopotentials within the local density approximation (LDA) in the framework of the density functional theory. The calculated lattice constant has been compared with the experimental value and has been found to be in good agreement with experimental data. The obtained electronic band structures show that PdGa compound has no band gap. The second-order elastic constants have been calculated, and the other related quantities such as the Young’s modulus, shear modulus, Poisson’s ratio, anisotropy factor, sound velocities, and Debye temperature have also been estimated. Our calculated results of elastic constants show that this compound is mechanically stable. Furthermore, the real and imaginary parts of the dielectric function and the optical constants such as the electron energy-loss function, the optical dielectric constant and the effective number of electrons per unit cell are calculated and presented in the study. The phonon dispersion curves are also derived using the direct method.     

Ab initio prediction on ferrotoroidic and electronic properties of olivine Li4MnFeCoNiP4O16

First-principles calculations predict that olivine Li4MnFeCoNiP4O16 has a large toroidal moment and ferrimagnetic configuration with a magnetic moment of 1.99μB per formula unit. Density functional theory plus U (DFT+U) shows an indirect band gap of 0.65 eV in this hypothetical material. The band gap is not simply related to the electronic conductivity when it is used as cathode material in rechargeable Li-ion batteries. Based on the orbital-resolved density of states for the transition-metal ions in the hypothetical material, Co, Ni and Mn are in the high-spin configuration while Fe is in the low-spin configuration, which leads to a large resulting toroidal moment deriving from the Co and Ni ions. The spin configuration of the transition-metal ions in the system breaks the space-and time-inversion symmetry and leads to the magnetoelectric property simultaneously. The ferrotoroidic domain, the fourth form of ferroic, is observed in this new material, as in the case of LiCoPO4 reported recently.     

Ab initio study of structural, electronic and optical properties of Ca1−xSrxS compounds

Full-potential linearized augmented plane wave method (FP-LAPW) within density functional theory has been used to calculate structural, electronic and optical properties of Ca_1−xSr_xS, an alkali earth chalcogenide, with varying compositional parameter x in the range 0<x<1. Whereas the structural properties are discussed in terms of charge transfer between the two cations, calculated electronic band structure and density of states have been analyzed in terms of contribution from the S p, Ca d and Sr d states. Furthermore, we have calculated some optical properties such as real and imaginary parts of dielectric constant, ε(ω), and the calculated results have been discussed in comparison with the existing experimental data and other theoretical calculations.     

Ab initio study of structural,electronic and optical properties of ternary CdO1-xSex alloys using special quasi-random structures

The structural, electronic, and optical properties of binary CdO, CdSe, and their ternary CdO1 xSexalloys(0 ≤ x ≤ 1) in the rock salt and zinc blend phases have been studied by the special quasi-random structure(SQS) method. All the calculations are performed using full-potential linearized augmented plane wave plus local orbital’s(FP-LAPW+lo) method within the framework of density function theory(DFT). We use Wu–Cohen(WC) generalized gradient approximation(GGA) to calculate structural parameters, whereas both Wu–Cohen and Engel–Vosko(EV) GGA have been applied to calculate electronic structure of the materials. Our predicted results of lattice constant and bulk modulus show only a slight deviation from Vegard’s law for the whole concentrations. The obtained band structure indicates that for the rock-salt phase, the ternary alloys present semi-metallic behavior, while for the zinc blend phase, semiconductor behavior with direct bandgap is observed with decreasing order of x except for CdSe. Finally, by incorporating the basic optical properties, we discuss the dielectric function, refractive index, optical reflectivity, the absorption coefficient, and optical conductivity in terms of incident photon energy up to 14 eV. The calculated results of both binaries are in agreement with existing experimental and theoretical values.     

第一性原理研究[112]硅锗异质结纳米线的电子结构与光学性质

基于密度泛函理论体系下的广义梯度近似,本文利用第一性原理方法着重研究了[112]晶向硅锗异质结纳米线的电子结构与光学性质.能带结构计算表明:随着锗原子数的增加,[112]晶向硅锗纳米线的带隙逐渐减小;对Si_(36)Ge_(24)H_(32)纳米线施加单轴应变,其能量带隙随拉应变的增加而单调减小.光学性质计算则表明:随着锗原子数的增加,[112]硅锗纳米线介电函数的峰位和吸收谱的吸收边均向低能量区移动;而随着拉应变的增大,吸收系数峰值呈现出逐渐减小的趋势,且峰位不断向低能量区移动,上述结果说明锗原子数的增加与施加拉应变均导致[112]硅锗纳米线的吸收谱产生红移.本文的研究为硅锗异质结纳米线光电器件研究与设计提供一定的理论参考.     

具有负泊松比效应的2D碳纳米结构设计及其性能的理论计算研究

本文利用第一性原理PBE密度泛函理论计算的方法设计了一种由炔基链、吡啶环及少量氢原子组成的具有内凹六边形结构单元的新型理想二维碳纳米结构,并对其平面内负泊松比效应等力学性能和光学性能与电子结构进行了预测.计算表明,该2D材料具有较好的结构稳定性和特殊的力学性能.当将该2D结构在面内(bc面)沿c方向压缩时,其在b方向收缩;当沿c方向拉伸时,其在b方向伸长,即该2D结构同样具有期望的负泊松比效应.材料的泊松比为-3.26;将该2D结构沿b方向拉伸时,c方向将随之伸长;沿b方向压缩时,c方向将随之收缩.沿b方向拉伸或压缩时,泊松比约为-1.951.即该2D材料在面内具有非常显著的负泊松比效应.此外,该2D材料表现出半导体材料的电子结构特征和良好的光反射和折射性能.希望本工作能为具有本征负泊松比效应和优良电子与光学功能的理想二维碳纳米材料的开发提供一种理想的结构设计策略.     

First-principles study of the structural,mechanical and electronic properties of ZnX2O4（X=Al,Cr and Ga）

This paper performs first-principles calculations to study the structural,mechanical and electronic properties of the spinels ZnAl2O4 ,ZnGa2O4 and ZnCr2O4 ,using density functional theory with the plane-wave pseudopotential method. Our calculations are in good agreement with previous theoretical calculations and the available experimental data. The studies in this paper focus on the evolution of the mechanical properties of ZnAl2O4 ,ZnGa2O4 and ZnCr2O4 under hydrostatic pressure. The results show that the cubic phases of ZnAl2O4 ,ZnGa2O4 and ZnCr2O4 become unstable at about 50 GPa,40 GPa and 25 GPa,respectively. From analysis of the band structure of the three compounds at equilibrium volume,it obtains a direct band gap of 4.35 eV for ZnAl2O4 and 0.89 eV for ZnCr2O4 ,while ZnGa2O4 has an indirect band gap of 2.73 eV.     

The mechanical,thermodynamic and electronic properties of Al3Nb with DO22 structure: A first-principles study

The lattice constants, elastic properties, electronic structure and thermodynamic properties of Al₃Nb with DO₂₂ structure have been investigated by the first-principles calculation. The calculated lattice constants were consistent with the experimental values, and the structural stability was also studied from the energetic point of view. The single-crystal elastic constants (C_ij) as well as polycrystalline elastic parameters (bulk modulus B, shear modulus G, Young's modulus E, Poisson's ratio υ and anisotropy value A) were calculated, and brittleness of Al₃Nb was discussed in detail. Besides, the electronic structure of tetragonal Al₃Nb was studied, which indicates a mixture of metallic bond and covalent bond in Al₃Nb and reveals the underlying mechanism of the stability and elastic properties of Al₃Nb. Finally, the thermodynamic properties of Al₃Nb were calculated and the physical properties such as heat capacity and Debye temperature were predicted within the quasi-harmonic approximation.