Effects of Coverage,Water,and Defects on Catechol/TiO2 Interface

Catechol adsorbed on TiO_(2)is one of the simplest models to explore the relevant properties of dye-sensitized solar cells.However,the effects of water and defects on the electronic levels and the excitonic properties of the catechol/TiO_(2)interface have been rarely explored.Here,we investigate four catechol/TiO_(2)interfaces aiming to study the influence of coverage,water,and defects on the electronic levels and the excitonic properties of the catechol/TiO_(2)interface through the first-principles many-body Green’s function theory.We find that the adsorption of catechol on the rutile(110)surface increases the energies of both the TiO_(2)valence band maximum and conduction band minimum by approximately 0.7 eV.The increasing coverage and the presence of water can reduce the optical absorption of charge-transfer excitons with maximum oscillator strength.Regarding the reduced hydroxylated TiO_(2)substrate,the conduction band minimum decreases greatly,resulting in a sub-bandgap of 2.51 eV.The exciton distributions in the four investigated interfaces can spread across several unit cells,especially for the hydroxylated TiO2substrate.Although the hydroxylated TiO_(2)substrate leads to a lower open-circuit voltage,it may increase the separation between photogenerated electrons and holes and may therefore be beneficial for improving the photovoltaic efficiency by controlling its concentration.Our results may provide guidance for the design of highly efficient solar cells in future.

Direct and Indirect Excitons in Two-Dimensional Covalent Organic Frameworks

Highly luminescent bulk two-dimensional covalent organic frameworks(COFs)attract much attention recently.Origin of their luminescence and their large Stokes shift is an open question.After first-principles calculations on two kinds of COFs using the GW method and Bethe-Salpeter equation,we find that monolayer COF has a direct band gap,while bulk COF is an indirect band-gap material.The calculated optical gap and optical absorption spectrum for the direct excitons of bulk COF agree with the experiment.However,the calculated energy of the indirect exciton,in which the photoelectron and the hole locate at the conduction band minimum and the valence band maximum of bulk COF respectively,is too low compared to the fluorescence spectrum in experiment.This may exclude the possible assistance of phonons in the luminescence of bulk COF.Luminescence of bulk COF might result from exciton recombination at the defects sites.The indirect band-gap character of bulk COF originates from its AA-stacked conformation.If the conformation is changed to the AB-stacked one,the band gap of COF becomes direct which may enhance the luminescence.

Ferrimagnetism induced by asymmetrical ferromagnetic next-nearest-neighbour exchange interactions in an antiferromagnetic spin-1/2 zigzag chain

The magnetic properties of an antiferromagnetic bond alternating spin-l/2 zigzag chain with asymmetrical ferro- magnetic next-nearest-neighbour exchange interactions at finite temperature are investigated by using the many-body Green＇s function theory. It is found that the ferrimagnetic ordering does not appear in the symmetrical next-nearest- neighbour coupling case, and takes place only for the asymmetrical next-nearest-neighbour case at finite temperature rather than the ground state. Furthermore, as the asymmetry degree of the next-nearest-neighbour exchange inter- actions increases, the ferrimagnetism becomes more and more dominant. It is shown that the elementary excitation spectra are responsible for the observed magnetic behaviour.

Spin Hall and spin Nernst effects in graphene with intrinsic and Rashba spin-orbit interactions

The spin Hall and spin Nernst effects in graphene are studied based on Green＇s function formalism. We calculate intrinsic contributions to spin Hall and spin Nernst conductivities in the Kane-Mele model with various structures. When both intrinsic and Rashba spin-orbit interactions are present, their interplay leads to some characteristics of the dependence of spin Hall and spin Nernst conductivities on the Fermi level. When the Rashba spin--orbit interaction is smaller than intrinsic spin-orbit coupling, a weak kink in the conductance appears. The kink disappears and a divergence appears when the Rashba spin-orbit interaction enhances. When the Rashba spin-orbit interaction approaches and is stronger than intrinsic spin-orbit coupling, the divergence becomes more obvious.

Spin resonance transport properties of a single Au atom in S–Au–S junction and Au–Au–Au junction

The spin transport properties of S–Au–S junction and Au–Au–Au junction between Au nanowires are investigated with density functional theory and the non-equilibrium Green＇s function. We mainly focus on the spin resonance transport properties of the center Au atom. The breaking of chemical bonds between anchor atoms and center Au atom significantly influences their spin transmission characteristics. We find the 0.8 eV orbital energy shift between anchor S atoms and the center Au atom can well protect the spin state stored in the S–Au–S junction and efficiently extract its spin state to the current by spin resonance mechanism, while the spin interaction of itinerant electrons and the valence electron of the center Au atom in the Au–Au–Au junction can extract the current spin information into the center Au atom. Fermi energy drift and bias-dependent spin filtering properties of the Au–Au–Au junction may transform information between distance, bias,and electron spin. Those unique properties make them potential candidates for a logical nanocircuit.

Study of Transport Properties in Armchair Graphyne Nanoribbons: A Density Functional Approach

In present paper, the non-equilibrium Green function(NEGF) method along with the density functional theory(DFT) are used to investigate the effect of width on transport and electronic properties of armchair graphyne(γ-graphyne) nanoribbons. The results show that all the studied nanoribbons are semiconductor and their band gaps decrease as the widths of nanoribbons increase, which will result in increasing current at a certain voltage. Also our results show the promising application of armchair graphyne nanoribbons in nano-electrical devices.

A first-principles study of dihydroazulene as a possible optical molecular switch

By applying nonequilibrium Green's function formalism combined with first-principles density functional theory, we investigate the electronic transport properties of the dihydroazulene optical molecular switch. Three kinds of adsorption sites including the hollow, bridge and top sites are studied. The two forms of this molecule, namely the open form and the closed form, can reversibly switch from each other upon photoexcitation. Their transmission spectra are remarkably distinctive. Theoretical results show that the current of the closed form is always significantly larger than that of the open form for all three adsorption sites, which promises this system as possibly one of the good candidates for optical switches due to its unique advantage, and which may have some potential applications in the future molecular circuit.