The LDA-1/2 method is employed in density functional theory calculations for the electronic structure of III-V dilute bismide systems. For the representative example of Ga(SbBi) with Bi concentrations below $10 \%$, it is shown that this method works very efficiently, especially due to its reasonably low demand on computer memory. The resulting bandstructure and wavefunctions are used to compute the interaction matrix elements that serve as input to microscopic calculations of the optical properties and intrinsic losses relevant for optoelectronic applications of dilute bismides.
In this study, we present the results of our first-principles calculations of the band structure, density of states and the Born effective charge tensors for the ferroelectric (ground state B1a1) and paraelectric (I4/mmm) phases of bismuth titanate. The calculations are done using the generalized gradient approximation (GGA) as well as the local density approximation (LDA) of the density functional theory. In contrast to the literature, our calculations on B1a1 structure using GGA and LDA yield smaller indirect band gaps as compared to the direct band gaps, in agreement with the experimental d…
In this contribution we assess the performance of two different exchange-correlation functionals in the first-principle prediction of the lattice thermal conductivity of bulk semiconductors, namely the local density approximation (LDA) and the Perdew-Burke-Ernzerhof implementation of the generalized gradient approximation (GGA). Both functionals are shown to give results in good agreement with experimental measurements. Such a consistency between the two functionals may seem a bit surprising, as the LDA is known to overbind and the GGA to soften the interatomic bonds. Such features ought to gr…
Spintronics is aimed at active controlling and manipulating the spin degrees of freedom in semiconductor devices. A promising way to achieve this goal is to make use of the tunable Rashba effect that relies on the spin-orbit interaction (SOI) in a two-dimensional (2D) electron system immersed in an inversion-asymmetric environment. The SOI induced spin-splitting of the 2D-electron state provides a basis for many theoretically proposed spintronic devices. However, the lack of semiconductors with large Rashba effect hinders realization of these devices in actual practice. Here we report on a gia…
The resistance R of a high density network of 6 nm diameter Bi wires in porous Vycor glass is studied in order to observe its expected semiconductor behavior. R increases from 300 K down to 0.3 K. Below 4 K, where R varies approximately as ln(1/T), the order-of-magnitude of the resistance rise, as well as the behavior of the magnetoresistance are consistent with localization and electron-electron interaction theories of a one-dimensional disordered conductor in the presence of strong spin-orbit scattering. We show that this behaviour and the surface-enhanced carrier density may mask the propos…
An oversight of several previous local density approximation (LDA) results appears to have led to an incomplete picture of the actual capability of density functional theory (DFT), with emphasis on LDA, to describe and to predict the band gaps of semiconductors [Phys. Rev. Lett. 105, 196403 (2010)]. LDA is portrayed as failing to describe the band gap of semiconductors. In light of the content of the literature, this characterization is misleading. These comments are intended to note some of these previous results and to provide an assessment of LDA capability that is drastically different fro…
This work constitutes a comprehensive and improved account of electronic-structure and mechanical properties of silicon-nitride (Si3N4) polymorphs via van Leeuwen and Baerends (LB) exchange-corrected local density approximation (LDA) that enforces the exact exchange potential asymptotic behavior. The calculated lattice constant, bulk modulus, and electronic band structure of Si3N4 polymorphs are in good agreement with experimental results. We also show that, for a single electron in a hydrogen atom, spherical well, or harmonic oscillator, the LB-corrected LDA reduces the (self-interaction) err…
Gallium oxide (Ga2O3) is a wide-band-gap semiconductor promising for UV sensors and high power transistor applications, with Baliga's figure of merit that far exceeds those of GaN and SiC, second only to diamond. Engineering its band structure through alloying will broaden its range of applications. Using hybrid density functional calculations we study the effects on adding Bi to Ga2O3. While in III-V semiconductors, such as GaAs and InAs, Bi tend to substitute on the pnictide site, we find that in Ga2O3, Bi prefers to substitute on the Ga site, resulting in dilute (Ga_{1-x}Bi_{x})2O3 alloys w…
We present quasiparticle self-consistent GW (QSGW) calculations of semimetallic bulk Bi. We go beyond the conventional QSGW method by including the spin-orbit coupling throughout the self-consistency cycle. This approach improves the description of the electron and the hole pockets considerably with respect to standard density functional theory (DFT), leading to excellent agreement with experiment. We employ this relativistic QSGW approach to conduct a study of the semimetal-to-semiconductor and the trivial-to-topological transitions that Bi experiences under strain. DFT predicts that an unphy…
In recent years, there has been increasing interest in the specific heat $C$ of insulators and semiconductors because of the availability of samples with different isotopic masses and the possibility of performing \textit{ab initio} calculations of its temperature dependence $C(T)$ using as a starting point the electronic band structure. Most of the crystals investigated are elemental (e.g., germanium) or binary (e.g., gallium nitride) semiconductors. The initial electronic calculations were performed in the local density approximation and did not include spin-orbit interaction. Agreement betw…
We report synthesis of single crystalline NaMnAs, confirm its antiferromagnetic order and characterise the sample by photoemission spectroscopy. The electronic structure was studied using optical transmittance, x-ray and ultraviolet spectroscopy and by theoretical modeling using local density approximation (LDA) extended to LDA+U when Heisenberg model parameters were determined. Optical transmittance measurement have confirmed the theoretical predictions that NaMnAs is a semiconductor. Also the Néel temperature was closer determined for the first time from temperature dependence of magnetizati…
Despite of its huge successes in vast amount of applications, the Kohn-Sham scheme of density functional theory (DFT-Kohn-Sham) has not been able to get reliable ionization potentials (IP) for semiconductors, due to self-interaction error in the local density approximation (LDA) and generalized gradient approximations (GGA), and the difficulty of using asymptotically long-ranged potentials for surface calculations. An approximate optimize effective potential (OEP), the Becke-Johnson'06 exchange, is used to explore the capability of OEP to calculate semiconductor IP with a surface technique sui…
The passivation of thin Bi(1 1 1) films with hydrogen and oxide capping layers is investigated from first principles. Considering termination-related changes of the crystal structure, we show how the bands and density of states are affected. In the context of the much discussed semimetal-to-semiconductor transition and the band topology of the bulk material, we consider the effects of confinement in the whole Brillouin zone and go beyond standard density functional theory by including many-body interactions via the G$_0$W$_0$ approximation. The conductivity of unterminated films is calculated …
The local-density approximation (LDA), together with the half-occupation (transition state) is notoriously successful in the calculation of atomic ionization potentials. When it comes to extended systems, such as a semiconductor infinite system, it has been very difficult to find a way to half-ionize because the hole tends to be infinitely extended (a Bloch wave). The answer to this problem lies in the LDA formalism itself. One proves that the half-occupation is equivalent to introducing the hole self-energy (electrostatic and exchange-correlation) into the Schroedinger equation. The argument …
Chu et al. recently reported extensive results of local density approximation (LDA) and of four (4) different Green function and dressed Coulomb (GW) approximation calculations of electronic properties of several semiconductors and insulators [Phys. Rev. B 93, 125210 (2016)].
One of the remarkable properties of the II-VI diluted magnetic semiconductor (ZnMn)Se is the giant spin splitting of the valence band states under application of the magnetic field (giant Zeeman splitting). This splitting reveals strong exchange interaction between Mn moments and semiconductor states. On the other hand, no magnetic phase transition has been observed for systems with small Mn content up to very low temperatures. The latter property shows weakness of the exchange interaction between Mn moments. In this paper, the local density approximation (LDA) and the LDA+U techniques are emp…
First principle calculations based on LDA/GGA approximation for the exchange functional underestimate the position of the semi core 3d levels in GaX (X = N, P and As) semiconductors. A self-interaction correction scheme within the LDA+U/GGA+U approximation is found to be sufficient to correct this discrepancy. A consequence of thiscorrection is that the bandgap (E_g) of the semiconductors also improves. The belief has been that the bandgap correction comes from modified semi core-valence interaction. We examine this often used approximation in great detail and find that although bandgap change…
Despite the growing interest in topological materials, the difficulty of experimentally synthesizing and integrating them with other materials has been one of the main barriers restricting access to their unique properties. Recent advances in synthesizing metastable phases of crystalline materials can help to overcome this barrier and offer new platforms to experimentally study and manipulate band topology. Because III-V semiconductors have a wide range of functional material applications (including optoelectronic devices, light-emitting diodes, and highly efficient solar cells), and because B…
We report quasiparticle-energy calculations of the electronic bandstructure as measured by valence-band photoemission for selected II-VI compounds and group-III-nitrides. By applying GW as perturbation to the ground state of the fictitious, non-interacting Kohn-Sham electrons of density-functional theory (DFT) we systematically study the electronic structure of zinc-blende GaN, ZnO, ZnS and CdS. Special emphasis is put on analysing the role played by the cation semicore d-electrons that are explicitly included as valence electrons in our pseudopotential approach. Unlike in the majority of prev…
The LDA-1/2 method expands Slater's half occupation technique to infinite solid state materials by introducing a self-energy potential centered at the anions to cancel the energy associated with electron-hole self-interaction. To avoid an infinite summation of long-ranged self-energy potentials they must be trimmed at a variationally-defined cutoff radius. The method has been successful in predicting accurate band gaps for a large number of elementary and binary semiconductors. Nevertheless, there has been some confusion regarding carbon and silicon, both in the cubic diamond structure, which …
In electronic structure calculations the optimized effective potential (OEP) is a method that treats exchange interactions exactly using a local potential within density-functional theory (DFT). We present a method using density functional perturbation theory combined with the Hylleraas variational method for finding the OEP by direct minimization which avoids any sum over unoccupied states. The method has been implemented within the plane-wave, pseudopotential formalism. Band structures for zinc blende semiconductors Si, Ge C, GaAs, CdTe and ZnSe, wurtzite semiconductors InN, GaN and ZnO and …
We study the possibility of pressure-induced transitions from a normal semiconductor to a topological insulator (TI) in bismuth tellurohalides using density functional theory and tight-binding method. In BiTeI this transition is realized through the formation of an intermediate phase, a Weyl semimetal, that leads to modification of surface state dispersions. In the topologically trivial phase, the surface states exhibit a Bychkov-Rashba type dispersion. The Weyl semimetal phase exists in a narrow pressure interval of 0.2 GPa. After the Weyl semimetal--TI transition occurs, the surface electron…
Layered non-centrosymmetric bismuth tellurohalides are being examined as candidates for topological insulators. Pressure is believed to be essential for inducing and tuning topological order in these systems. Through electrical transport and Raman scattering measurements, we find superconductivity in two high-pressure phases of BiTeCl with the different normal state features, carrier characteristics, and upper critical field behaviors. Superconductivity emerges when the resistivity maximum or charge density wave is suppressed by the applied pressure and then persists till the highest pressure …
BiVO3F is a promising material used in solar energy conversion systems. Here, we first report the calculated structural, electronic, and surface reaction properties using PBE and hybrid density functionals. We found it is a direct band gap semiconductor, and the calculated band gap is consistent with experimental value only using the hybrid density functional with a fraction of Hartree Fock (HF) exchange α=0.1. The (001) surface is the most stable surface among all the low index (001), (010), and (100) surfaces. There are V and Bi sites exposed on (001) surface which can serves as activity sit…
The electronic structure of noble-gas solids is calculated within density functional theory's exact-exchange method (EXX) and compared with the results from the local-density approximation (LDA). It is shown that the EXX method does not reproduce the fundamental energy gaps as well as has been reported for semiconductors. However, the EXX-Kohn-Sham energy gaps for these materials reproduce about 80 % of the experimental optical gaps. The structural properties of noble-gas solids are described by the EXX method as poorly as by the LDA one. This is due to missing Van der Waals interactions in bo…
The bulk photovoltaic effect generates intrinsic photocurrents in materials without inversion symmetry. Shift current is one of the bulk photovoltaic phenomena related to the Berry phase of the constituting electronic bands: photo-excited carriers coherently shift in real space due to the difference in the Berry connection between the valence and conduction bands. Ferroelectric semiconductors and Weyl semimetals are known to exhibit such nonlinear optical phenomena. Here we consider chalcopyrite semiconductor ZnSnP$_2$ which lacks inversion symmetry and calculate the shift current conductivity…
Bismuth chalcogenides Bi$_2$Se$_3$ and Bi$_2$Te$_3$ are semiconductors, which can be both thermoelectric materials (TE) and topological insulators (TI). Lattice defects arising from vacancies, impurities, or dopants in these materials are important in that they provide the charge carriers in TE applications and compromise the performance of these materials as TIs. We present the first solid-state nuclear magnetic resonance (NMR) study of the $^{77}$Se and $^{125}$Te NMR resonances in polycrystalline powders of Bi$_2$Se$_3$ and Bi$_2$Te$_3$, respectively. The spin-lattice ($T_1$) relaxation is …
Half Heusler (HH) thermoelectric alloys provide a wide platform to choose materials with non-toxic and earth abundant elements. This article presents an ab-initio theoretical evaluation of electrical and thermal transport properties of three Bismuth-based most promising thermoelectric alloys, selected out of 54 stable HH compounds. These are brand new compounds which are recently proposed to be stable (Nature Chem. 7, 308 (2015)) and may have interesting properties. The calculated band structure of the three compounds, namely HfRhBi, ZrIrBi and ZrRhBi, served as a hint for their promising ther…
Thermoelectric (TE) materials research plays a vital role in heat-to-electrical energy conversion and refrigeration applications. Bismuth-antimony (Bi-Sb) alloy is a promising material for thermoelectric cooling. Herein, a high figure of merit, ZT, near 0.6 at cryogenic temperatures (100-150K) has been achieved in melt-spun n-type Bi85Sb15 bulk samples consisting of micron-size grains. The achieved ZT is nearly 50 percents higher than polycrystalline averaged single crystal ZT of ~0.4, and it is also significantly higher than ZT of less than ~0.3 measured below 150K in Bi-Te alloys commonly us…
The quasiparticle band structures of four polytypes 3C, 6H, 4H, and 2H of GaP, GaAs, GaSb, InP, InAs, and InSb are computed with high accuracy including spin-orbit interaction applying a recently developed approximate calculation scheme, the LDA-1/2 method. The results are used to derive band offsets $ΔE_c$ and $ΔE_v$ for the conduction and valence bands between two polytypes. The alignment of the band structures is based on the branch-point energy $E_{\rm BP}$ for each polytype. The aligned electronic structures are used to explain properties of heterocrystalline but homomaterial junctions. T…
Semiconductor core$-$shell nanowires based on the GaAs substrate are building blocks of many photonic, photovoltaic and electronic devices, thanks to the associated direct band-gap and the highly tunable optoelectronic properties. The selection of a suitable material system is crucial for custom designed nanowires tailored for optimised device performance. The bismuth containing GaAs materials are an imminent class of semiconductors which not only enable an exquisite control over the alloy strain and electronic structure but also offer the possibility to suppress internal loss mechanisms in ph…
A LMTO implementation of Aversa and Sipe's length-gauge formalism for calculating the full frequency dependent second-harmonic generation in the independent particle approximation is presented. It is applied to GaAs, GaP, 3C-SiC, c-BN and wurtzite and zincblende GaN and AlN. The use of the scissor's operator for correcting LDA errors is discussed and compared to an alternative approach in which the Hamiltonian is corrected. The latter is found to be superior. Decomposition in omega and 2 omega resonances and in intra- and inter-band contributions and in specific band-to-band contributions are …
We observe significant effects of structural distortion on electronic and optical properties of CdGa_2X_4 (X = S, Se, Te) defect chalcopyrite. The calculation is carried out within Density functional theory based tight binding linear muffin tin orbital (TB-LMTO) method. Structural parameters and band gap of CdGa_2X_4 agree well with the available experimental values within LDA limit. Change in band gap due to structural distortion is 3.63%, 4.0%, and 8.8% respectively. We observe significant change in optical properties also due to this effect. Effects on optical properties come mainly from op…
The new bismuth chalcogenide La0.92Bi1.08S3 crystallizes in the monoclinic space group C2/m with a = 28.0447(19) Å, b = 4.0722(2) Å, c = 14.7350(9) Å, and $β$ = 118.493(5)°. The structure of La0.92Bi1.08S3 is built up of NaCl-type Bi2S5 blocks, and BiS4 and LaS5 infinitely long chains forming a compact three-dimensional framework with parallel tunnels. Optical spectroscopy and resistivity measurements reveal a semiconducting behavior with a band gap of ~ 1 eV and activation energy for transport of 0.36(1) eV. Thermopower measurements suggest the majority carriers of La0.92Bi1.08S3 are electron…
We have carried out ab-initio calculation and study of structural and electronic properties of AgAlM2 (M = S, Se, Te) chalcopyrite semiconductors using Density Functional Theory (DFT) based self consistent Tight binding Linear Muffin Tin orbital (TB-LMTO) method. Calculated equlibrium values of lattice constants, anion displacement parameter (u), tetragonal distortion (η = c/2a) and bond lengths have good agreement with experimental values. Our study suggests these semiconductors to be direct band gap semiconductors with band gaps 1.98 eV, 1.59 eV and 1.36 eV respectively. These are in good ag…
Accurate low-order structure factors (Fg) measured by quantitative convergent beam electron diffraction (QCBED) were used for validation of different density functional theory (DFT) approximations. 23 low-order Fg were measured by QCBED for the transition metals Cr, Fe, Co, Ni, and Cu, and the transition metal based intermetallic phases γ-TiAl, β-NiAl and γ1-FePd using a multi-beam off-zone axis (MBOZA) method and then compared with Fg calculated ab-initio by DFT using the local spin density approximation (LDA) and LDA+U, and different generalized gradient approximations (GGA) functionals. Dif…
We report the structural and electronic properties of chalcopyrite semiconductors CuInSe2, CuIn2 Se4 and Cu0.5Li0.5InSe2. Our calculation is based on Density functional Theory within tight binding linear muffin-tin orbital (TB-LMTO) method. The calculated lattice constants, anion displacement (u), tetragonal distortion (η = c/2a) and bond lengths agree well with experimental values. Our result shows these compounds are direct band gap semiconductors. Our calculated band gaps, 0.79eV and 1.08 eV of CuInSe2 and Cu0.5Li0.5InSe2 respectively agree well with the experimental values within the limit…
Phase engineering by strains in 2D semiconductors is of great importance for a variety of applications. Here, we present a study of strain induced ferroelectric (FE) transition on bismuth oxyselenide (Bi$_2$O$_2$Se) films, a high-performance (HP) semiconductor for next-generation electronics. Bi$_2$O$_2$Se is non-FE at ambient. Upon a loading force $\gtrsim 400$ nN, piezoelectric force responses exhibit butterfly loops on magnitude and 180$^\textrm{o}$ phase switching. By carefully ruling out extrinsic factors, these features are attributed to a transition to FE phase. The transition is furthe…
The journey of theoretical study on semiconductors is reviewed in a non-conventional way. We have started with the basic introduction of Hartree-Fock method and introduce the fundamentals of Density Functional Theory (DFT). From the oldest Local Density Approximations (LDA) to the most recent developments of semi-local corrections [Generalised Gradient Approximation (GGA), Meta-GGAs], hybrid functionals and orbital dependent methodologies are discussed in detail. To showcase the performance of DFT, results obtained via different approximations are compared. We indicate the success of semi-loca…
We have investigated the electronic structure of fluorite Cu$_{2}$Se using density functional theory calculations within the LDA, PBE and AM05 approximations as well as with the non-local hybrid PBE0 and HSE approximations. Our results show that Cu$_{2}$Se is a zero gap semiconductor when using either a local or semi-local density functional approximation while there exists a gap when using the PBE0 functional. For the HSE approximation, we find that the presence of a gap depends on the range separation for the non-local exchange within the HSE approximation. For the occupied states we find th…
In the density-functional studies of materials with localized electronic states, the local/semilocal exchange-correlation functionals are often either combined with a Hubbard parameter $U$ as in the LDA+$U$ method or mixed with a fraction of exactly computed (Fock) exchange energy yielding a hybrid functional. Although some inaccuracies of the semilocal density approximations are thus fixed to a certain extent, the improvements are not sufficient to make the predictions agree with the experimental data. Here we put forward the perspective that the hybrid functional scheme and the LDA+$U$ metho…
An oversight of several previous results from local density approximation (LDA) calculations appear to have led to an incomplete, and hence misleading, characterization of the capability of density functional theory (DFT) to describe correctly the electronic properties of wurtzite GaN (w-GaN) and InN (w-InN) [Phys. Rev. B 82, 115102 (2010)]. These comments are aimed at presenting a different picture of the above capability for DFT calculations that solve self-consistently the system of equations of DFT. They also underscore, in light of the experimentally established Burstein-Moss effect, the …
We have studied the structural and electronic properties of defect chalcopyrite semiconductors AAl2Se4 (A = Ag, Cu, Cd, Zn) using Density Functional Theory (DFT) based first principle technique within Tight binding Linear Muffin Tin orbital (TB-LMTO) method. Our calculated structural parameters such as lattice constants, anion displacement parameter (u), tetragonal distortion (η = c/2a), bond lengths and bulk modulus are in good agreement with other work. Our band structure calculation suggests that these compounds are direct band gap semiconductors having band gaps 2.40, 2.50, 2.46 and 2.82 e…
We present excited states density functional theory (DFT) to calculate band gap for semiconductors and insulators. For the excited states exchange-correlation functional, we use a simple local density approximation (LDA) like functional and it gives the result which is very closed to experimental results. The linear muffin-tin potential is used to solve the self consistent Kohn-Sham equation
We present a detailed study of the exchange-correlation hole and exchange-correlation energy per particle in the Si crystal as calculated by the Variational Monte Carlo method and predicted by various density functional models. Nonlocal density averaging methods prove to be successful in correcting severe errors in the local density approximation (LDA) at low densities where the density changes dramatically over the correlation length of the LDA hole, but fail to provide systematic improvements at higher densities where the effects of density inhomogeneity are more subtle. Exchange and correla…
We present ab-initio electronic structure results on the surface of sqr3 adsorbates. In particular, we address the issue of metal-insulator instabilities, charge-density-waves (CDWs) or spin-density-waves (SDWs), driven by partly filled surface states and their 2D Fermi surface, and/or by the onset of magnetic instabilities. The focus is both on the newly discovered commensurate CDW transitions in the Pb/Ge(111) and Sn/Ge(111) structures, and on the puzzling semiconducting behavior of the Pb/Ge(111), K/Si(111):B and SiC(0001) surfaces. In all cases, the main factor driving the instability appe…
We assess the validity of various exchange-correlation functionals for computing the structural, vibrational, dielectric, and thermodynamical properties of materials in the framework of density-functional perturbation theory (DFPT). We consider five generalized-gradient approximation (GGA) functionals (PBE, PBEsol, WC, AM05, and HTBS) as well as the local density approximation (LDA) functional. We investigate a wide variety of materials including a semiconductor (silicon), a metal (copper), and various insulators (SiO$_2$ $α$-quartz and stishovite, ZrSiO$_4$ zircon, and MgO periclase). For the…
For a set of ten crystalline materials (oxides and semiconductors), we compute the electronic band structures using the Tran-Blaha [Phys. Rev. Lett. 102, 226401 (2009)] (TB09) functional. The band widths and gaps are compared with those from the local-density approximation (LDA) functional, many-body perturbation theory (MBPT), and experiments. At the density-functional theory (DFT) level, TB09 leads to band gaps in much better agreement with experiments than LDA. However, we observe that it globally underestimates, often strongly, the valence (and conduction) band widths (more than LDA). MBPT…
Solar cells based on a light absorbing layer of the organometal halide perovskite CH$_3$NH$_3$PbI$_3$ have recently reached 15% conversion efficiency, though how these materials work remains largely unknown. We analyse the electronic structure and optical properties within the quasiparticle self-consistent GW approximation. While this compound bears some similarity to conventional sp semiconductors, it also displays unique features. Quasiparticle self-consistency is essential for an accurate description of the band structure: bandgaps are much larger than what is predicted by the local density…
We report accurate, calculated electronic, transport, and bulk properties of zinc blende gallium arsenide (GaAs). Our ab-initio, non-relativistic, self-consistent calculations employed a local density approximation (LDA) potential and the linear combination of atomic orbital (LCAO) formalism. We strictly followed the Bagayoko, Zhao, and William (BZW) method as enhanced by Ekuma and Franklin (BZW-EF). Our calculated, direct band gap of 1.429 eV, at an experimental lattice constant of 5.65325 Å, is in excellent agreement with the experimental values. The calculated, total density of states data …
It is necessary to employ quasi-particle calculations to correct band gap problems in LDA. As an expedient way for the reliable but massive GWA, Quasi-Particle-LDA (QPLDA) is proposed by several authors, where the total computational cost scales with N. Historically, Sham and Kohn introduced the idea of the local mass operator based on local wavenumber similar to WKB, but did not execute actual numerical calculations. They took into account exchange interaction only, from which we could not expect precise treatments anyway. Later, Pickett and Wang had proposed a more qualitative method and had…
We investigate the electronic structure of gap and band tail states in amorphous silicon. Starting with two 216-atom models of amorphous silicon with defect concentration close to the experiments, we systematically study the dependence of electron localization on basis set, density functional and spin polarization using the first principles density functional code Siesta. We briefly compare three different schemes for characterizing localization: information entropy, inverse participation ratio and spatial variance. Our results show that to accurately describe defect structures within self con…
Density functional theory within the local or semilocal density approximations (DFT-LDA/GGA) has become a workhorse in electronic structure theory of solids, being extremely fast and reliable for energetics and structural properties, yet remaining highly inaccurate for predicting band gaps of semiconductors and insulators. Accurate prediction of band gaps using firstprinciples methods is time consuming, requiring hybrid functionals, quasi-particle GW, or quantum Monte Carlo methods. Efficiently correcting DFT-LDA/GGA band gaps and unveiling the main chemical and structural factors involved in …
