No Arabic abstract
Nanoscrolls (papyrus-like nanostructures) are very attractive structures for a variety of applications, due to their tunable diameter values and large accessible surface area. They have been successfully synthesized from different materials. In this work we have investigated, through fully atomistic molecular dynamics simulations, the dynamics of scroll formation for a series of graphenelike carbon nitride (CN) twodimensional systems: gCN, triazinebased gC3N4, and heptazinebased gC3N4. Our results show that stable nanoscrolls can be formed for all of these structures. Possible synthetic routes to produce these nanostructures are also addressed.
Carbon nitride-based nanostructures have attracted special attention (from theory and experiments) due to their remarkable electromechanical properties. In this work we have investigated the mechanical properties of some graphene-like carbon nitride membranes through fully atomistic reactive molecular dynamics simulations. We have analyzed three different structures of these CN families, the so-called graphene-based g-CN, triazine-based g-C3N4 and heptazine-based g-C3N4. The stretching dynamics of these membranes was studied for deformations along their two main axes and at three different temperatures: 10K, 300K and 600K. We show that g-CN membranes have the lowest ultimate fracture strain value, followed by heptazine-based and triazine-based ones, respectively. This behavior can be explained in terms of their differences in terms of density values, topologies and types of chemical bonds. The dependency of the fracture patterns on the stretching directions is also discussed.
Three new novel phases of carbon nitride (CN) bilayer, which are named as alpha-C$_{2}$N$_{2}$, beta-C$_{2}$N$_{2}$ and gamma-C$_{4}$N$_{4}$, respectively, have been predicted in this paper. All of them are consisted of two CN sheets connected by C-C covalent bonds. The phonon dispersions reveal that all these phases are dynamically stable, since no imaginary frequency is found for them. Transition path way between alpha-C$_{2}$N$_{2}$ and beta-C$_{2}$N$_{2}$ is investigated, which involves bond-breaking and bond-reforming between C and N. This conversion is difficult, since the activation energy barrier is found to be 1.90 eV per unit cell, high enough to prevent the transformation at room temperature. Electronic structures calculations show that they are all semiconductors with indirect band gap of 3.76 / 5.22 eV, 4.23 / 5.75 eV and 2.06 / 3.53 eV by PBE / HSE calculation, respectively. The beta-C$_{2}$N$_{2}$ has the widest band gap among the three phases. From our results, the three new two-dimensional materials have potential applications in the electronics, semiconductors, optics and spintronics.
At least four two- or quasi-one- dimensional allotropes and a mixture of them were theoretically predicted or experimentally observed for low-dimensional Te, namely the {alpha}, b{eta}, {gamma}, {delta} and chiral-{alpha}+{delta} phases. Among them the {gamma} and {alpha} phases were found the most stable phases for monolayer and thicker layers, respectively. Here, we found two novel low-dimensional phases, namely the {epsilon} and {zeta} phases. The {zeta} phase is over 29 meV/Te more stable than and the {epsilon} phase shows comparable stability with the most stable monolayer {gamma} phase. The energetic difference between the {zeta} and {alpha} phases reduces with respect to the increased layer thickness and vanishes at the four-layer (12-sublayer) thickness, while this thickness increases under change doping. Both {epsilon} and {zeta} phases are metallic chains and layers, respectively. The {zeta} phase, with very strong interlayer coupling, shows quantum well states in its layer-dependent bandstructures. These results provide significantly insight into the understanding of polytypism in Te few-layers and may boost tremendous studies on properties of various few-layer phases.
Hexagonal boron nitride (hBN) is a wide bandgap van der Waals material that has recently emerged as promising platform for quantum photonics experiments. In this work we study the formation and localization of narrowband quantum emitters in large flakes (up to tens of microns wide) of hBN. The emitters can be activated in as-grown hBN by electron irradiation or high temperature annealing, and the emitter formation probability can be increased by ion implantation or focused laser irradiation of the as-grown material. Interestingly, we show that the emitters are always localized at edges of the flakes, unlike most luminescent point defects in 3D materials. Our results constitute an important step on the road map of deploying hBN in nanophotonics applications.
In this study we present a theoretical investigation of structural, electronic and mechanical properties of pentagonal monolayers of carbon (p-graphene), boron nitride (p-B$_{2}$N$_{4}$ and p-B$_{4}$N$_{2}$) and silver azide (p-AgN$_{3}$) by performing state-of-the-art first principles calculations. Our total energy calculations suggest feasible formation of monolayer crystal structures composed entirely of pentagons. In addition, electronic band dispersion calculations indicate that while p-graphene and p-AgN$_{3}$ are semiconductors with indirect bandgaps, p-BN structures display metallic behavior. We also investigate the mechanical properties (in-plane stiffness and the Poissons ratio) of four different pentagonal structures under uniaxial strain. p-graphene is found to have the highest stiffness value and the corresponding Poissons ratio is found to be negative. Similarly, p-B$_{2}$N$_{4}$ and p-B$_{4}$N$_{2}$ have negative Poissons ratio values. On the other hand, the p-AgN$_{3}$ has a large and positive Poissons ratio. In dynamical stability tests based on calculated phonon spectra of these pentagonal monolayers, we find that only p-graphene and p-B$_{2}$N$_{4}$ are stable, but p-AgN$_{3}$ and p-B$_{4}$N$_{2}$ are vulnerable against vibrational excitations.