arXiv subjects

Suhas Nahas

Publications and source records attributed to Suhas Nahas.

5 recordsLinked to original sources

arXiv2020

Spontaneous ferromagnetism and finite surface energy gap in the topological insulator Bi$_2$Se$_3$ from surface Bi$_\rm{Se}$ antisite defects

We perform ab-initio calculations on Bi$_\mathrm{Se}$ antisite defects in the surface of Bi$_2$Se$_3$, finding strong low-energy defect resonances with a spontaneous ferromagnetism, fixed to an out-of-plane orientation due to an exceptional large magnetic anisotropy energy. For antisite defects in the surface layer, we find semi-itinerant ferromagnetism and strong hybridization with the Dirac surface state, generating a finite energy gap. For deeper lying defects, such hybridization is largely absent, the magnetic moments becomes more localized, and no energy gap is present.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗

arXiv2019

Electronic structure and transport in amorphous metal oxide and amorphous metal oxy-nitride semiconductors

Recently amorphous oxide semiconductors (AOS) have gained commercial interest due to their low-temperature processability, high mobility and areal uniformity for display backplanes and other large area applications. A multi-cation amorphous oxide (a-IGZO) has been researched extensively and is now being used in commercial applications. It is proposed in the literature that overlapping In-5s orbitals form the conduction path and the carrier mobility is limited due to the presence of multiple cations which create a potential barrier for the electronic transport in a-IGZO semiconductors. A multi-anion approach towards amorphous semiconductors has been suggested to overcome this limitation and has been shown to achieve hall mobilities up to an order of magnitude higher compared to multi-cation amorphous semiconductors. In the present work, we compare the electronic structure and electronic transport in a multi-cation amorphous semiconductor, a-IGZO and a multi-anion amorphous semiconductor, a-ZnON using computational methods. Our results show that in a-IGZO, the carrier transport path is through the overlap of outer s-orbitals of mixed cations and in a-ZnON, the transport path is formed by the overlap of Zn-4s orbitals, which is the only type of metal cation present. We also show that for multi-component ionic amorphous semiconductors, electron transport can be explained in terms of orbital overlap integral which can be calculated from structural information and has a direct correlation with the carrier effective mass which is calculated using computationally expensive first principle DFT methods.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2016

First Principles Prediction of Amorphous Phases Using Evolutionary Algorithms

We discuss the efficacy of evolutionary method for the purpose of structural analysis of amorphous solids. At present ab initio molecular dynamics (MD) based melt-quench technique is used and this deterministic approach has proven to be successful to study amorphous materials. We show that a stochastic approach motivated by Darwinian evolution can also be used to simulate amorphous structures. Applying this method, in conjunction with density functional theory (DFT) based electronic, ionic and cell relaxation, we re-investigate two well known amorphous semiconductors, namely silicon and indium gallium zinc oxide (IGZO). We find that characteristic structural parameters like average bond length and bond angle are within $\sim$ 2% to those reported by ab initio MD calculations and experimental studies.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2016

New ground states of fluorinated and oxidized phosphorene: structural and electronic properties

We systematically explore chemical functionalization of monolayer black phosphorene via chemisorption of oxygen and fluorine atoms. Using the cluster expansion technique, with vary- ing concentration of the adsorbate, we determine the ground states considering both single- as well as double- side chemisorption, which have novel chemical and electronic properties. The nature of the bandgap depends on the concentration of the adsorbate: for fluorination the direct bandgap first decreases, and then increases while becoming indirect, with increasing fluorination, while for oxidation the bandgap first increases and then decreases, while mostly maintaining its direct nature. Further we find that the unique anisotropic free-carrier effective mass for both the electrons and holes, can be changed and even rotated by 90 degrees, with controlled chemisorption, which can be useful for exploring unusual quantum Hall effect, and novel electronic devices based on phosphorene.

cond-mat.mtrl-sci↗

arXiv2015

Electric field induced gap modification in ultrathin blue phosphorous

We investigate the possibility of band structure engineering in the recently predicted 2D layered form of blue phosphorus via an electric field (E$_z$) applied perpendicular to the layer(s). Using density functional theory, we study the effect of a transverse electric field in monolayer, as well as three differently stacked bilayer structures of blue phosphorus. We find that, for E$_z > 0.2$ V/Å the direct energy gap at the $Γ$ point, which is much larger than the default indirect band gap of mono- and bilayer blue phosphorus, decreases linearly with the increasing electric field; becomes comparable to the default indirect band gap at E$_z \approx 0.45 (0.35)$ V/Å for monolayer (bilayers) and decreases further until the semiconductor to metal transition of 2D blue phosphorus takes place at E$_z\approx 0.7 (0.5)$ V/Å for monolayer (bilayers). Calculated values of the electron and hole effective masses along various high symmetry directions in the reciprocal lattice suggests that the mobility of charge carriers is also influenced by the applied electric field.

cond-mat.mes-hall↗