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Speeding up tight binding calculations using zone-folding methods

Liu, Tian Xiang ; Pistol, Mats Erik LU ; Pryor, Craig and Mao, Li (2022) In Computational Materials Science 211.
Abstract

Tight binding models are widely used in large scale electronic structure calculations of nanostructures. Their atomistic nature makes them flexible, but also means the computational cost increases rapidly with system size. The large number of calculations required to design nanostructures makes computational efficiency desirable. We have developed a method to increase computational speed while retaining most of its accuracy. The method is based on the use of supercells and zone folding combined with a truncation of the Hamiltonians to only include states close to the band-edges. We apply the method to model the band edge energies of a GaAs/AlAs quantum well grown along the [110]-directions with 3D and 2D periodic boundary conditions as... (More)

Tight binding models are widely used in large scale electronic structure calculations of nanostructures. Their atomistic nature makes them flexible, but also means the computational cost increases rapidly with system size. The large number of calculations required to design nanostructures makes computational efficiency desirable. We have developed a method to increase computational speed while retaining most of its accuracy. The method is based on the use of supercells and zone folding combined with a truncation of the Hamiltonians to only include states close to the band-edges. We apply the method to model the band edge energies of a GaAs/AlAs quantum well grown along the [110]-directions with 3D and 2D periodic boundary conditions as well as the density of states and dielectric function of the quantum well. We typically find a speed-up of ten times with only a small loss of accuracy of the calculation result.

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author
; ; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
Brillouin zone-folding, Semiconductors, Tight-binding
in
Computational Materials Science
volume
211
article number
111479
publisher
Elsevier
external identifiers
  • scopus:85129935903
ISSN
0927-0256
DOI
10.1016/j.commatsci.2022.111479
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
4f97d41c-ecfc-49bd-916b-40d50760efec
date added to LUP
2022-07-14 13:20:29
date last changed
2023-11-21 06:16:59
@article{4f97d41c-ecfc-49bd-916b-40d50760efec,
  abstract     = {{<p>Tight binding models are widely used in large scale electronic structure calculations of nanostructures. Their atomistic nature makes them flexible, but also means the computational cost increases rapidly with system size. The large number of calculations required to design nanostructures makes computational efficiency desirable. We have developed a method to increase computational speed while retaining most of its accuracy. The method is based on the use of supercells and zone folding combined with a truncation of the Hamiltonians to only include states close to the band-edges. We apply the method to model the band edge energies of a GaAs/AlAs quantum well grown along the [110]-directions with 3D and 2D periodic boundary conditions as well as the density of states and dielectric function of the quantum well. We typically find a speed-up of ten times with only a small loss of accuracy of the calculation result.</p>}},
  author       = {{Liu, Tian Xiang and Pistol, Mats Erik and Pryor, Craig and Mao, Li}},
  issn         = {{0927-0256}},
  keywords     = {{Brillouin zone-folding; Semiconductors; Tight-binding}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  publisher    = {{Elsevier}},
  series       = {{Computational Materials Science}},
  title        = {{Speeding up tight binding calculations using zone-folding methods}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.commatsci.2022.111479}},
  doi          = {{10.1016/j.commatsci.2022.111479}},
  volume       = {{211}},
  year         = {{2022}},
}