Feature-rich electronic properties of aluminum-doped graphenes

Abstract

The electronic properties of aluminum-doped graphenes enriched by multi-orbital hybridizations are investigated using first-principles calculations. The feature-rich electronic structures exhibit the quasi-rigid red shifts of the carbon-created energy bands, the Al-dominated valence and conduction bands, and many free electrons in the conduction Dirac cone. These are directly reflected in the special structures of density of states (DOS). The Al- and alkali-induced high free carrier densities are almost the same. There exist certain important differences among the Al-, alkali- and halogen-doped grapehenes, such as, the buckled or planar graphene, the preserved or seriously distorted Dirac cone, the existence of the adatom-dominated valence bands, the free electrons or holes, the degenerate or splitting spin-related states, and the simple or complicated peaks in DOS. The similarities and differences mainly come from the diverse orbital hybridizations in adatom-C bonds, as indicated from the atom-dominated bands, the spatial charge distributions and the orbital-projected DOS.