Electrical Transport of Zn-doped Dirac Semimetal Cd<sub>3</sub>As<sub>2</sub> Films

ORAL

Abstract

Topological semimetals (TSMs) are emerging as materials with potential use in low powered electronics and spintronic devices but detailed studies focusing on reliable epitaxial growth, disorder, and the control of electronic states in TSM films are needed. In this work we focus on the use of alloying with Zn to modify the electronic structure and electrical transport of (Cd1-xZnx)3As2 with x = 0 - 0.23. Zn doping of Cd3As2 has been used to lower the carrier concentration and move the Fermi energy closer to the Dirac point but significant Zn doping causes a transition from a TSM to a semiconductor [1]. By tuning the growth conditions to suppress native defects [2] we are able to produce films with carrier concentrations a full order of magnitude smaller (~1017 cm-3) than other literature reports (>1018 cm-3). Lowering the starting carrier concentration enables us to tune the Fermi energy with smaller amounts of Zn doping. We will present a careful analysis of the electrical transport properties to explore the low Zn doping regime where the n-type carrier densities reach their lowest values before the electronic structure is significantly altered.

[1] H. Li, et. al., Sci. Rep. 7, 3148 (2017).

[2] A. D. Rice, et. al., PRM. 3, 121201(R) (2019).

*This work was authored by the National Renewable Energy Laboratory, operated by Alliance for Sustainable Energy, LLC, for the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) under Contract No. DE-AC3608GO28308. Funding provided by the U.S. Department of Energy Office of Science, Basic Energy Sciences, Physical Behavior of Materials program. The research used High-Performance Computing (HPC) resources of the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC), a DOE-SC user facility located at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, operated under Contract No. DE-AC02-05CH11231. This research also used HPC resources at NREL, sponsored by DOE, Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy. The views expressed in the article do not necessarily represent the views of the DOE or the U.S. Government. The U.S. Government retains and the publisher, by accepting the article for publication, acknowledges that the U.S. Government retains a nonexclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, worldwide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this work, or allow others to do so, for U.S. Government purposes.

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Publication: [1] I. A. Leahy, J. N. Nelson, A. D. Rice, and K. Alberi (2022, planned)

Presenters

  • Ian Leahy

    • National Renewable Energy Laboratory

Authors

  • Ian Leahy

    • National Renewable Energy Laboratory

  • Jocienne N Nelson

    • National Renewable Energy Laboratory

  • Kirstin M Alberi

    • National Renewable Energy Laboratory

  • Anthony Rice

    • National Renewable Energy Laboratory