Metal/semiconductor hybrids are artificially created structures presenting novel properties not exhibited by either of the component materials alone. Here we present a giant piezoresistance effect in a hybrid formed from silicon and aluminum. The maximum piezoresistive gage factor (GF) of 843, measured at room temperature, compares with a GF of -93 measured in the bulk homogeneous silicon. This piezoresistance boost is not due to the silicon/aluminum interface, but results from a stress induced anisotropy in the silicon conductivity that acts to switch current away from the highly conductive aluminum for uniaxial tensile strains. Its magnitude is shown, via the calculation of hybrid resistivity weighting functions, to depend only on the geometrical arrangement of the component parts of the hybrid.
The room-temperature longitudinal piezoresistance of n-type and p-type crystalline silicon along selected crystal axes is investigated under uniaxial compressive stresses up to 3 GPa. While the conductance ($G$) of n-type silicon eventually saturates at $\approx 45%$ of its zero-stress value ($G_0$) in accordance with the charge transfer model, in p-type material $G/G_0$ increases above a predicted limit of $\approx 4.5$ without any significant saturation, even at 3 GPa. Calculation of $G/G_0$ using \textit{ab-initio} density functional theory reveals that neither $G$ nor the mobility, when pr…
Layered iridates have been the subject of intense scrutiny on account of their unusually strong spin-orbit coupling, which opens up a narrow gap in a material that would otherwise be a metal. This insulating state is very sensitive to external perturbations. Here, we show that vertical compression at the nanoscale, delivered using the tip of a standard scanning probe microscope, is capable of inducing a five orders of magnitude change in the room temperature resistivity of Sr2IrO4. The extreme sensitivity of the electronic structure to anisotropic deformations opens up a new angle of interest …
The giant piezoresistance (PZR) previously reported in silicon nanowires is experimentally investigated in a large number of surface depleted silicon nano- and micro-structures. The resistance is shown to vary strongly with time due to electron and hole trapping at the sample surfaces. Importantly, this time varying resistance manifests itself as an apparent giant PZR identical to that reported elsewhere. By modulating the applied stress in time, the true PZR of the structures is found to be comparable with that of bulk silicon.
Piezoresistance is the change in the electrical resistance, or more specifically the resistivity, of a solid induced by an applied mechanical stress. The origin of this effect in bulk, crystalline materials like Silicon, is principally a change in the electronic structure which leads to a modification of the charge carriers effective mass. The last few years have seen a rising interest in the piezoresistive properties of semiconductor nanostructures, motivated in large part by claims of a giant piezoresistance effect in Silicon nanowires that is more than two orders of magnitude bigger than th…
The steady-state, space-charge-limited piezoresistance (PZR) of defect-engineered, silicon-on-insulator device layers containing silicon divacancy defects changes sign as a function of applied bias. Above a punch-through voltage ($V_t$) corresponding to the onset of a space-charge-limited hole current, the longitudinal $\langle 110 \rangle$ PZR $π$-coefficient is $π\approx 65 \times 10^{-11}$~Pa$^{-1}$, similar to the value obtained in charge-neutral, p-type silicon. Below $V_t$, the mechanical stress dependence of the Shockley-Read-Hall (SRH) recombination parameters, specifically the divacan…
We report the realization of the optically induced inverse population of the ground-state spin sublevels of the silicon vacancies ($V_{\mathrm{Si}}$) in silicon carbide (SiC) at room temperature. The data show that the probed silicon vacancy spin ensemble can be prepared in a coherent superposition of the spin states. Rabi nutations persist for more than 80 $μ$s. Two opposite schemes of the optical alignment of the populations between the ground-state spin sublevels of the silicon vacancy upon illumination with unpolarized light are realized in 4H- and 6H-SiC at room temperature. These altoget…
Identification of microscopic configuration of point defects acting as quantum bits is a key step in the advance of quantum information processing and sensing. Among the numerous candidates, silicon vacancy related centers in silicon carbide (SiC) have shown remarkable properties owing to their particular spin-3/2 ground and excited states. Although, these centers were observed decades ago, still two competing models, the isolated negatively charged silicon vacancy and the complex of negatively charged silicon vacancy and neutral carbon vacancy [Phys. Rev. Lett.\ \textbf{115}, 247602 (2015)] a…
We report the first observation of stable single photon sources in silicon carbide (SiC). These sources are extremely bright and operate at room temperature demonstrating that SiC is a viable material in which to realize various quantum information, computation and photonic applications. The maximum single photon count rate detected is 700k counts/s with an inferred quantum efficiency around 70%. The single photon sources are due to intrinsic deep level defects constituted of carbon antisite-vacancy pairs. These are shown to be formed controllably by electron irradiation. The variability of th…
Room-temperature quantum oscillations of static magnetic susceptibility of silicon-carbide epitaxial layers grown on a silicon substrate by the method of the coordinated substitution of atoms
Generation of single photons has been demonstrated in several systems. However, none of them satisfies all the conditions, e.g. room temperature functionality, telecom wavelength operation, high efficiency, as required for practical applications. Here, we report the fabrication of light emitting diodes (LEDs) based on intrinsic defects in silicon carbide (SiC). To fabricate our devices we used a standard semiconductor manufacturing technology in combination with high-energy electron irradiation. The room temperature electroluminescence (EL) of our LEDs reveals two strong emission bands in visi…
Bulk silicon carbide (SiC) is a very promising material system for bio-applications and quantum sensing. However, its optical activity lies beyond the near infrared spectral window for in-vivo imaging and fiber communications due to a large forbidden energy gap. Here, we report the fabrication of SiC nanocrystals and isolation of different nanocrystal fractions ranged from 600 nm down to 60 nm in size. The structural analysis reveals further fragmentation of the smallest nanocrystals into ca. 10-nm-size clusters of high crystalline quality, separated by amorphization areas. We use neutron irra…
The demand for single photon sources at $λ~=~1.54~μ$m, which follows from the consistent development of quantum networks based on commercial optical fibers, makes Er:O$_x$ centers in Si still a viable resource thanks to the optical transition of $Er^{3+}~:~^4I_{13/2}~\rightarrow~^4I_{15/2}$. Yet, to date, the implementation of such system remains hindered by its extremely low emission rate. In this Letter, we explore the room-temperature photoluminescence (PL) at the telecomm wavelength of very low implantation doses of $Er:O_x$ in $Si$. The emitted photons, excited by a $λ~=~792~nm$ laser in …
We demonstrate a silicon-based high frequency nanomechanical device capable of switching controllably between two states at room temperature. The device uses a nanomechanical resonator with two distinct states in the hysteretic nonlinear regime. In contrast to prior work, we demonstrate room temperature electrostatic actuation and sensing of the switching device with 100% fidelity by phase modulating the drive signal. This phase-modulated device can be used as a low-power high-speed mechanical switch integrated on-chip with silicon circuitry.
Current-voltage measurements have been made at room temperature on a Si-rich silicon oxide film deposited via Electron-Cyclotron Resonance Plasma Enhanced Chemical Vapor Deposition (ECR-PECVD) and annealed at 750 - 1000$ ^\circ$C. The thickness of oxide between Si quantum dots embedded in the film increases with the increase of annealing temperature. This leads to the decrease of current density as the annealing temperature is increased. Assuming the Fowler-Nordheim tunneling mechanism in large electric fields, we obtain an effective barrier height $ϕ_{eff}$ of $\sim$ 0.7 $\pm$ 0.1 eV for an e…
Photoluminescence is observed at room temperature from phonon-assisted band-to-band emission in Si (1.067 eV peak) using unpatterned bulk p-type silicon wafer samples that were spin-coated with Er-doped (6 at. %) silica-gel films (0.13 micron) and vacuum annealed; the strongest emission was obtained at ~700 degrees C. Comparative study of annealing behavior indicates two-orders of magnitude efficiency enhancement. Emission from Er+3 ions in the silica film is used to gauge relative emission strengths. Mechanisms for inducing emission from silicon utilizing stresses in sol-gel-films are discuss…
Defects ~10 nm in size, with number densities ~10^{10} cm^{-2}, form spontaneously beneath ion-milled, etched, or HF-dipped silicon surfaces examined in our Ti-ion getter-pumped transmission electron microscope (TEM) after exposure to air. They appear as weakly-strained non-crystalline intrusions into silicon bulk, that show up best in the TEM under conditions of strong edge or bend contrast. If ambient air exposure is <10 minutes, defect nucleation and growth can be monitored {\em in situ}. Possible mechanisms of formation are discussed.
We investigate the chemical and structural configuration of acetophenone on Si(001) using synchrotron radiation core-level spectroscopy techniques and density functional theory calculations. Samples were prepared by vapour phase dosing of clean Si(001) surfaces with acetophenone in ultrahigh vacuum. Near edge X-ray adsorption fine structure spectroscopy and photoelectron spectroscopy measurements were made at room temperature as a function of coverage density and post-deposition anneal temperature. We show that the dominant room temperature adsorption structure lies flat on the substrate, whil…
The "textbook" phonon mean free path (MFP) of heat carrying phonons in silicon at room temperature is ~40 nm. However, a large contribution to the thermal conductivity comes from low-frequency phonons with much longer MFPs. We present a simple experiment demonstrating that room temperature thermal transport in Si significantly deviates from the diffusion model already at micron distances. Absorption of crossed laser pulses in a freestanding silicon membrane sets up a sinusoidal temperature profile that is monitored via diffraction of a probe laser beam. By changing the period of the thermal gr…
The use of cryogenic silicon as a detector medium for dark matter searches is gaining popularity. Many of these searches are highly dependent on the value of the photoelectric absorption cross section of silicon at low temperatures, particularly near the silicon band gap energy, where the searches are most sensitive to low mass dark matter candidates. While such cross section data has been lacking from the literature, previous dark matter search experiments have attempted to estimate this parameter by extrapolating it from higher temperature data. However, discrepancies in the high temperature…
We study the electronic transport in lightly phosphorus-doped hydrogenated microcrystalline silicon ($μ$c-Si:H) and nominally undoped hydrogenated silicon carbide ($μ$c-SiC:H) by temperature-dependent Hall measurements. The material properties cover different crystallinities and doping concentrations. For$μ$c-Si:H samples, the carrier concentration is altered by electron bombardment and subsequent step-wise annealing of defects. We describe the behavior of conductivity, mobility, and carrier concentration in terms of the Meyer-Neldel rule (MNR) and anti-MNR. We present the first sample switchi…
An optimized interatomic potential has been constructed for silicon using a modified Tersoff model. The potential reproduces a wide range of properties of Si and improves over existing potentials with respect to point defect structures and energies, surface energies and reconstructions, thermal expansion, melting temperature and other properties. The proposed potential is compared with three other potentials from the literature. The potentials demonstrate reasonable agreement with first-principles binding energies of small Si clusters as well as single-layer and bilayer silicenes. The four pot…
To augment the magnetoresistance (MR) ratio of n-type non-degenerate Si-based lateral spin valves (Si-LSVs), we modify the doping profile in the Si layer and introduce a larger local strain into the Si channel by changing a capping insulator. The highest MR ratio of 1.4% is achieved in the Si-LSVs through these improvements, with significant roles played by a reduction in the resistance-area product of the ferromagnetic contacts and an enhancement of the momentum relaxation time in the Si channel.
The silicon-vacancy (SiV) center in diamond is typically found in three stable charge states, SiV0, SiV- and SiV2-, but studying the processes leading to their formation is challenging, especially at room temperature, due to their starkly different photo-luminescence rates. Here, we use confocal fluorescence microscopy to activate and probe charge interconversion between all three charge states under ambient conditions. In particular, we witness the formation of SiV0 via the two-step capture of diffusing, photo-generated holes, a process we expose both through direct SiV0 fluorescence measurem…
It is shown for the first time, that room temperature Ultrasonic Defect Manipulation (UDM) can significantly reduce the concentration of radiation defects in high resistivity silicon. Secondary Ion Mass Spectroscopy revealed that oxygen- and hydrogen- related chemical reactions in silicon are likely to occur under UDM at room temperature. Ultrasonically stimulated chemical reactions in solids can be an important source of energy, which is required for UDM.
We demonstrate spin-accumulation signals controlled by the gate voltage in a metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistor structure with a Si channel and a CoFe/$n^{+}$-Si contact at room temperature. Under the application of a back-gate voltage, we clearly observe the three-terminal Hanle-effect signal, i.e., spin-accumulation signal. The magnitude of the spin-accumulation signals can be reduced with increasing the gate voltage. We consider that the gate controlled spin signals are attributed to the change in the carrier density in the Si channel beneath the CoFe/$n^{+}$-Si contact. This…
Using a metal-oxide-semiconductor field effect transistor (MOSFET) structure with a high-quality CoFe/n^+Si contact, we systematically study spin injection and spin accumulation in a nondegenerated Si channel with a doping density of ~ 4.5*10^15cm^-3 at room temperature. By applying the gate voltage (V_G) to the channel, we obtain sufficient bias currents (I_Bias) for creating spin accumulation in the channel and observe clear spin-accumulation signals even at room temperature. Whereas the magnitude of the spin signals is enhanced by increasing I_Bias, it is reduced by increasing V_G interesti…
A negative kink in excess conductivity is observed in p-type non-degenerate (moderate dopant concentration) silicon wafers when excited by a very narrow pulse of 532 nm laser appearing just after the complete positive decay of dark conductivity voltage. Most of the Si samples are pristine, and 3 of them are irradiated with gamma, proton, and chlorine ion beams respectively. These transients were examined using a time-resolved millimeter-wave conductivity apparatus (TRmmWC ) and the radiofrequency (RF) voltage response (after laser cut-off) consistently reveals a positive peak with nominal deca…
Time-dependent rotational electric polarizations have been proposed to generate temporally varying magnetic moments, for example, through a combination of ferroelectric polarization and optical phonons. This phenomenon has been called dynamical multiferroicity, but explicit experimental demonstrations have been elusive to date. Here, we report the detection of a temporal magnetic moment as high as 1.2 mu_B/atom in charge-doped thin film of silicon under flexural strain. We demonstrate that the magnetic moment is generated by a combination of electric polarization arising from a flexoelectronic…
Ferromagnetism above room temperature was observed in Cr-doped hydrogenated amorphous silicon films deposited by rf magnetron-sputtering. Structure analysis reveals that films are amorphous without any detectable precipitates up to the solubility limit 16 atomic percentages of Cr. Experimental results suggest that hydrogenation has a dramatic influence on magnetic properties, electrical conductivity and carrier concentration in the thin films. Pronounced anomalous Hall effect and magnetization curve both suggest the origin of the ferromagnetism may arises from percolation of magnetic polarons.
We investigate the pump efficiency of silicon vacancy-related spins in silicon carbide. For a crystal inserted into a microwave cavity with a resonance frequency of 9.4 GHz, the spin population inversion factor of 75 with the saturation optical pump power of about 350 mW is achieved at room temperature. At cryogenic temperature, the pump efficiency drastically increases, owing to an exceptionally long spin-lattice relaxation time exceeding one minute. Based on the experimental results, we find realistic conditions under which a silicon carbide maser can operate in continuous-wave mode and serv…
Single photon emitters (SPEs) play an important role in a number of quantum information tasks such as quantum key distributions. In these protocols, telecom wavelength photons are desired due to their low transmission loss in optical fibers. In this paper, we present a study of bright single-photon emitters in cubic silicon carbide (3C-SiC) emitting in the telecom range. We find that these emitters are photostable and bright at room temperature with a count rate of ~ MHz. Together with the fact that SiC is a growth and fabrication-friendly material, our result may pave the way for its future a…
Large-scale optoelectronics integration is strongly limited by the lack of efficient light sources, which could be integrated with the silicon complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) technology. Persistent efforts continue to achieve efficient light emission from silicon in the extending the silicon technology into fully integrated optoelectronic circuits. Here, we report the realization of room-temperature stimulated emission in the technologically crucial 1.5 micron wavelength range from Er-doped GaN multiple-quantum wells on silicon and sapphire. Employing the well-acknowledged varia…
We propose a di-interstitial model for the P6 center commonly observed in ion implanted silicon. The di-interstitial structure and transition paths between different defect orientations can explain the thermally activated transition of the P6 center from low-temperature C1h to room-temperature D2d symmetry. The activation energy for the defect reorientation determined by ab initio calculations is 0.5 eV in agreement with the experiment. Our di-interstitial model establishes a link between point defects and extended defects, di-interstitials providing the nuclei for the growth.
Controlled engineering of isolated solid state quantum systems is one of the most prominent goals in modern nanotechnology. In this letter we demonstrate a previously unknown quantum system namely silicon carbide tetrapods. The tetrapods have a cubic polytype core (3C) and hexagonal polytype legs (4H) a geometry that creates a spontaneous polarization within a single tetrapod. Modeling of the tetrapod structures predict that a bound exciton should exist at the 3C 4H interface. The simulations are confirmed by the observation of fully polarized and narrowband single photon emission from the tet…
The dynamics of the luminescence decay from germanium nanocrystals embedded in crystalline silicon has been studied for temperatures varied between 16 K and room temperature. At room temperature the characteristic decay time is of the order of 50 nanoseconds while it extends into the microsecond range at low temperatures. The decay is dominated by non-radiative processes, which show a typical thermal activation energy of a few meV.
A spin battery concept is applied for the dynamical generation of pure spin current and spin transport in p-type silicon (p-Si). Ferromagnetic resonance and effective s-d coupling in Ni80Fe20 results in spin accumulation at the Ni80Fe20/p-Si interface, inducing spin injection and the generation of spin current in the p-Si. The pure spin current is converted to a charge current by the inverse spin Hall effect of Pd evaporated onto the p-Si. This approach demonstrates the generation and transport of pure spin current in p-Si at room temperature.
In the vicinity of their resonance frequency, piezoelectric resonators are highly sensitive to small perturbations. The present report is focussed on the magnetic field as a perturbation source. First, magneto-dielectric modulation of more than 10% is achieved at room temperature on both ferroelectric single crystals and quartz discs. Since such piezoelectric resonators are now available as membranes directly integrated on Silicon wafer, we have checked the magneto-dielectric modulation in such resonators. We show here for the first time that a moderate magnetic field of 2.104 Oersteds is able…
The unique quantum properties of the nitrogen-vacancy (NV) center in diamond have motivated efforts to find defects with similar properties in silicon carbide (SiC), which can extend the functionality of such systems not available to the diamond. Electron paramagnetic resonance (EPR) and optically detected magnetic resonance (ODMR) investigations presented here suggest that silicon vacancy (VSi) related point defects in SiC possess properties the similar to those of the NV center in diamond, which in turn make them a promising quantum system for single-defect and single-photon spectroscopy in …
We present a technique to tune the charge density of epitaxial graphene via an electrostatic gate that is buried in the silicon carbide substrate. The result is a device in which graphene remains accessible for further manipulation or investigation. Via nitrogen or phosphor implantation into a silicon carbide wafer and subsequent graphene growth, devices can routinely be fabricated using standard semiconductor technology. We have optimized samples for room temperature as well as for cryogenic temperature operation. Depending on implantation dose and temperature we operate in two gating regimes…
We perform molecular dynamics simulations to investigate the reduction of the thermal conductivity by kinks in silicon nanowires. The reduction percentage can be as high as 70% at room temperature. The temperature dependence of the reduction is also calculated. By calculating phonon polarization vectors, two mechanisms are found to be responsible for the reduced thermal conductivity: (1) the interchanging effect between the longitudinal and transverse phonon modes and (2) the pinching effect, i.e a new type of localization, for the twisting and transverse phonon modes in the kinked silicon nan…
Spin-charge interconversion phenomena at the interface between magnetic materials and topological insulators (TIs) are attracting enormous interest in the research effort towards the development of fast and ultra-low power devices for the future information and communication technology. We report a large spin-to-charge conversion efficiency in Au/Co/Au/Sb2Te3/Si(111) heterostructures based on Sb2Te3 TIs grown by metal organic chemical vapor deposition on 4 inches Si(111) substrates. By conducting room temperature spin pumping ferromagnetic resonance, we measure an inverse Edelstein Effect leng…
Room temperature operation of a spin exclusive or (XOR) gate was demonstrated in lateral spin valve devices with nondegenerate silicon (Si) channels. The spin XOR gate is a fundamental part of the magnetic logic gate (MLG) that enables reconfigurable and nonvolatile NAND or OR operation in one device. The device for the spin XOR gate consists of three iron (Fe)/cobalt (Co)/magnesium oxide (MgO) electrodes, i.e., two input and one output electrodes. Spins are injected into the Si channel from the input electrodes whose spin angular momentum corresponds to the binary input 1 or 0. The spin drift…
Germanium has emerged as an exceptionally promising material for spintronics and quantum information applications, with significant fundamental advantages over silicon. However, efforts to create atomic-scale devices using donor atoms as qubits have largely focussed on phosphorus in silicon. Positioning phosphorus in silicon with atomic-scale precision requires a thermal incorporation anneal, but the low success rate for this step has been shown to be a fundamental limitation prohibiting the scale-up to large-scale devices. Here, we present a comprehensive study of arsine (AsH$_3$) on the germ…
Spin defects in silicon carbide (SiC) with mature wafer-scale fabrication and micro/nano-processing technologies have recently drawn considerable attention. Although room temperature single-spin manipulation of colour centres in SiC has been demonstrated, the typically detected contrast is less than 2%, and the photon count rate is also low. Here, we present the coherent manipulation of single divacancy spins in 4H-SiC with a high readout contrast (-30%) and a high photon count rate (150 kilo counts per second) under ambient conditions, which are competitive with the nitrogen-vacancy (NV) cent…
Quantum Noise Spectroscopy of Nanoscale Charge Defects in Silicon Carbide at Room Temperature
School of Biomedical Engineering, Division of Life Sciences and Medicine, University of Science and Technology of China（中国科学技术大学生命科学与医学部生物医学工程学院）；Laboratory of Spin Magnetic Resonance, School of Physical Sciences, Anhui Province Key Laboratory of Scientific Instrument Development and Application, University of Science and Technology of China（中国科学技术大学物理学院自旋磁共振实验室、安徽省科学仪器开发与应用重点实验室）；Suzhou Institute for Advanced Research, University of Science and Technology of China（中国科学技术大学苏州高等研究院）；Hefei National Laboratory, University of Science and Technology of China（中国科学技术大学合肥国家实验室）
Interactions between rhenium impurities in silicon are investigated by means of the density functional theory (DFT) and the DFT+U scheme. All couplings between impurities are ferromagnetic except the Re-Re dimers which in the DFT method are nonmagnetic, due to formation of the chemical bond supported by substantial relaxation of the geometry. The critical temperature is calculated by means of classical Monte Carlo (MC) simulations with the Heisenberg hamiltonian. The uniform ferromagnetic phase is obtained with the DFT exchange interactions at room temperature for the impurities concentration …
The heat-carrying acoustic excitations of amorphous silicon are of interest because their mean free paths may approach micron scales at room temperature. Despite extensive investigation, the origin of the weak acoustic damping in the heat-carrying frequencies remains a topic of debate. Here, we report measurements of the thermal conductivity mean free path accumulation function in amorphous silicon thin films from 60 - 315 K using transient grating spectroscopy. With additional picosecond acoustics measurements and considering the known frequency-dependencies of damping mechanisms in glasses, …
Methods for the creation of thin amorphous silicon dioxide (aSiO2) layers on crystalline silicon substrates with very high densities of silicon dangling bonds (so called E' centers) have been explored and volume densities of [E']> 5x10^18 cm-3 throughout a 60nm thick film have been demonstrated by exposure of a thermal oxide layer to a low pressure Argon radio frequency plasma. While the generated high E' center densities can be annealed completely at 300C, they are comparatively stable at room temperature with a half life of about one month. Spin relaxation time measurements of these states b…
Si-based photodetectors satisfy the criteria of low-cost and environmental-friendly, and can enable the development of on-chip complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS)-compatible photonic systems. However, extending their room-temperature photoresponse into the mid-wavelength infrared (MWIR) regime remains challenging due to the intrinsic bandgap of Si. Here, we report on a comprehensive study of a room-temperature MWIR photodetector based on Si hyperdoped with Te. The demonstrated MWIR p-n photodiode exhibits a spectral photoresponse up to 5 μm and a slightly lower detector performance …
Prior studies have shown that photoluminescence from Er3+ impurities in silicon is severely limited at room temperature by non-radiative relaxation and solid solubility; and room temperature emission from Er3+ in oxide-based hosts becomes diminished at high erbium concentrations. This work presents studies of thin films (0.2 micron thick) prepared by vacuum co-evaporation from elemental sources (Er, Si and Si/Ge) followed by vacuum annealing (600 degrees C); materials of this type, which are produced with high Er3+ concentrations, are shown to be capable of yielding strong room-temperature pho…
Silicon is one of the most frequently used chemical elements of the periodic table in nanotechnology. Two-dimensional (2D) silicene, a silicon analog of graphene, has been readily obtained to make field-effect transistors since 2015. Recently, as new members of the silicene family, penta-silicene and its nanoribbon have been experimentally grown on Ag(110) surface with exotic electronic properties. However, the thermoelectric performance of penta-silicene has not been so far studied that would hinder its potential applications of electric generation from waste heat and solid-state Peltier cool…
