Ab initio study of 3d, 4d, and 5d transition metal adatoms and dimers adsorbed on hydrogen-passivated zigzag graphene nanoribbons

We performed extensive density-functional calculations of the structural, electronic, and magnetic properties of systems comprising one or two adatoms of Fe, Co, Ni, Ru, Rh, Pd, or Pt adsorbed on a hydrogen-passivated zigzag graphene nanoribbon (GNR). In all cases, the most stable structure featured the adatom(s) at positions near one of the edges of the GNR. However, whereas in the most stable structures of the single-adatom systems Ni/GNR, Ru/GNR, Rh/GNR, and Pd/GNR the adatom was located above a bay of the zigzag edge, Fe/GNR and Co/GNR were found to be most stable when the adatoms were at a first-row hole site, while the two configurations were nearly equienergetic for Pt/GNR. Similarly, whereas the most stable structures of the two-adatom systems Ni-2/GNR, Ru-2/GNR, Rh-2/GNR, and Pd-2/GNR had the adatoms above two neighboring edge bays, Co-2/GNR and Pt-2/GNR were most stable with the adatoms stacked in a double-decker configuration above a single edge bay, and Fe-2/GNR with the adatoms stacked at a single first-row hole site. Adatom adsorption involved strong hybridization between the metal d states and the GNR states, and adsorption at sites near a GNR edge generally reduced the average magnetic moment of carbon atoms at that edge to near zero, though in some cases-notably two Co-2/GNR configurations-it led to the GNR edges having non-negligible magnetic moments of the same sign even though at the start of the optimization the metal atoms were nonmagnetic and the GNR edges had opposite signs (the preferred configuration of the pristine GNR). The electronic character of GNRs with adsorbed transitionmetal atoms or dimers depended on the species and concentration of the adsorbate and on the adsorption site(s), different stable or near-stable systems exhibiting semiconducting, zero-gap semiconducting, metallic, or half-metallic behavior.