Biased doped silicene as a source for advanced electronics

TL;DR

This paper explores how impurity atoms and applied voltage in buckled silicene can induce localized states and phase transitions, offering potential for tunable nanoelectronic devices.

Contribution

It demonstrates the possibility of controlling electronic spectrum restructuring and metal-insulator transitions in silicene through impurity and electric field manipulation.

Findings

Localized impurity levels form within the band gap.

Electric bias can induce metal-insulator phase transitions.

Effects are significant at low impurity concentrations and moderate temperatures.

Abstract

Restructuring of electronic spectrum in a buckled silicene monolayer under some applied voltage between its two sublattices and in presence of certain impurity atoms is considered. A special attention is given to formation of localized impurity levels within the band gap and the to their collectivization at finite impurity concentration. It is shown that a qualitative restructuring of quasiparticle spectrum within the initial band gap and then specific metal-insulator phase transitions are possible for such disordered system and can be effectively controlled by variation of the electric field bias at given impurity perturbation potential and concentration. Since these effects are expected at low impurity concentrations but at not too low temperatures, they can be promising for practical applications in nanoelectronics devices.