Ternary Semiconductors NiZrSn and CoZrBi with half-Heusler structure: a first-principles study

TL;DR

This study uses first-principles calculations to explore the structural, electronic, and thermoelectric properties of NiZrSn and CoZrBi half-Heusler semiconductors, revealing defect effects and doping challenges.

Contribution

It provides detailed first-principles insights into the defect chemistry, electronic structure, and thermoelectric potential of NiZrSn and CoZrBi, which were previously not well characterized.

Findings

NiZrSn is a small-band-gap semiconductor with ~0.5 eV gap.

CoZrBi has a larger band gap of about 1 eV.

Defects such as Ni_i and V_Ni significantly affect the electronic properties and thermopower.

Abstract

The ternary semiconductors NiZrSn and CoZrBi with C1_b crystal structure are introduced by calculating their basic structural, electronic and phononic properties using density functional theory. Both the gradient-corrected PBE functional and the hybrid functional HSE06 are employed. While NiZrSn is found to be a small-band-gap semiconductor (E_g = 0.46 eV in PBE and 0.60 eV in HSE06), CoZrBi has a band gap of 1.01 eV in PBE (1.34 eV in HSE06). Moreover, effective masses and deformation potentials are reported. In both materials ABC, the intrinsic point defects introduced by species A (Ni or Co) are calculated. The Co-induced defects in CoZrBi are found to have a higher formation energy compared to Ni-induced defects in NiZrSn. The interstitial Ni atom (Ni_i ) as well as the V_Ni Ni_i complex introduce defect states in the band gap, whereas the Ni vacancy (V_Ni) only reduces the size of the band gap. Motivated by the reported use of NiZrSn for thermoelectric applications, the Seebeck coefficient of both materials is calculated. We find that CoZrBi displays a rather large thermopower of up to 500 micro-V/K when p-doped, whereas NiZrSn possesses its maximum thermopower in the n-type regime. The reported difficulties in achieving p-type doping in NiZrSn could be rationalized by the unintended formation of Ni_i^2+ in conjunction with extrinsic acceptors, resulting in their compensation. Moreover, it is found that all types of defects considered, when present in concentrations as large as 3%, tend to reduce the thermopower compared to ideal bulk crystals at T=600K. For NiZrSn, the calculated thermodynamic data suggest that additional Ni impurities could be removed by annealing, leading to precipitation of a metallic Ni_2ZrSn phase.