Zinc Sulphide Doped With Chromium. A Density Functional Theory Study

Bachelor Thesis from the year 2017 in the subject Physics - Theoretical Physics, grade: 4.00, University of Gujrat, course: physics, language: English, abstract: In this thesis, the electronic and magnetic properties of Cr doped wurtzite ZnS were studied by means of most advanced theoretical approach density functional theory (DFT) using generalized gradient approximation (GGA) functional and its correction factor GGA+U. Calculations have shown that doping of chromium at cationic sites of wurtzite zinc sulphide results in formation of a p-type semiconductor. Addition of hubbard term in the system causes an increase in band gap value and creates a gap between spin up and spin down channels for 3d states of chromium atoms.

Chromium doped ZnS possess half metallic character because of excess in majority spin carriers than minority ones. Hopping of electrons in anti-bonding states of chromium atoms refers to the ferromagnetic behavior of the material. Half metallicity and ferromagnetic nature of the chromium doped wurtzite zinc sulphide makes this material a best candidate to be used in the field of spintronics.

For the past few decades, work in semiconductor field appears to be of substantial importance in industrial world and offers a new direction to upgrade the standards of life. This novel era of semi-conductors has remake the history of science with its groundbreaking technology and has proven to be an extensively emerging field to handle even single atoms and molecules for manipulation and fabrications. In the recent years, material science has open a new window towards applicability of semiconductor devices in electronics, spintronics and many other branches of science. Presently, II-VI materials have gain much value because of their broad range of applicability in advance fields of science. These elements involve transition metals like zinc, cadmium and nonmetals like oxygen, sulphur, selenium, tellurium. Due to their wide band gap, these compounds possess shorter wavelength and used in optoelectronic devices.