The electronic properties and electron transport of sawtooth penta-graphene nanoribbon under uniaxial strain: ab-initio study

ABSTRACT

The electronic properties and electron transport of a sawtooth penta-graphene nanoribbon (SSPGNR) under uniaxial strains are theoretically studied by density-functional theory (DFT) in combination with the non-equilibrium Green's function formalism. We investigated the electronic structures and the current–voltage (I–V) characteristics of the SSPGNRs under a sequence of uniaxial strains in range from 10% compression to 10% stretch. In this strained range, carbon atoms still keep a pentagon network, but with the changing bond lengths. The C–C bond lengths change almost linearly with the tolerable strain. The value of the band gap of SSPGNRs can be depicted as a parabola under uniaxial strain. Our calculations show that the current is monotonous increase with compressive strain at the same applied bias voltage. In case of tensile strain, the variable rule of the current is different that it increases at first and decrease later. The fundamental physical properties (band structure, I–V characteristic) of SSPGNRs seem to be more sensitive to compressive strain than the stretch strain. The current intensity of the compressive-SSPGNR is by 2 orders of magnitude compared to that of the tensile-SSPGNR at the same strain in range from 6% to 10%. The results obtained from our calculations are beneficial to practical applications of these strained structures in SSPGNRs-based electromechanical devices.