Theoretical study of electron transport properties of SimCn /Cn clusters tethered on graphene nanoribbon

Electron transport properties of optimized typical SimCn/C-n clusters, including Si4C, Si8C5, Si9C6, C-6, C-12 and C-13, connected to zigzag graphene nanoribbon (ZGNR) electrodes are theoretically studied through first-principles density functional theory (DFT). As for Si4C, Si8C5, Si9C6 clusters, the transmission values at the fermi level show a decreasing tendency with the increase in the number of carbon and silicon atoms. Interestingly, Si9C6 cluster with ring structure (C-6) has poor electron transport properties in spite of C-6 showing good electron transport properties. Although C-12 cluster shows smaller transmission values at the fermi level, when adding an atom to it, - C-13 shows excellent electron transport properties. The electrode coupling of ZGNR-C-12 is the strongest compared with ZGNR-C-6 and ZGNR-C-15 because it forms spa orbital which has stronger bond. Our findings may pave a new path for the exploration of nano electronics.