Assessing the Effects of Temperature and Oxygen Vacancy on Band Gap Renormalization in LaCrO3-δ: First-Principles and Experimental Corroboration

Understanding the temperature dependence of functional properties in high-temperature gas sensors is vital for applications in combustion environments. Temperature effect on the electronic structure due to electron-phonon coupling is a key property of interest as this influences other responses of sensors. In this work, we assess the impact of temperature on band gap renormalization of pristine and oxygen-vacant LaCrO_3-δ perovskite employing Allen-Heine-Cardona theory with first-principles simulations and corroborate with experimental observation. Antiferromagnetic cubic LaCrO₃ shows a direct ground-state band gap of 2.62 eV that is reduced by over 1 eV due to the presence of oxygen vacancies, which can form endothermically. We find excellent agreement in temperature-dependent band gap shift in LaCrO₃ between theory and an in-house experiment, proving that the theory can adequately predict renormalization on the band gap in a magnetic system. Band gaps in cubic LaCrO_3-δ are found to monotonically narrow by 1.13 eV in pristine and by around 0.62 eV in oxygen-vacant structures as temperature increases from 0 to 1500 K. The predicted band gap variations are rationalized using an analytical model. The experimental zero-temperature band gaps are extracted from the model fits that can provide useful insights on the simulated band gaps.

Combined plasmonic Au-nanoparticle and conducting metal oxide high-temperature optical sensing with LSTO

Fiber optic sensor technology offers several advantages for harsh-environment applications. However, the development of optical gas sensing layers that are stable under harsh environmental conditions is an ongoing research challenge. In this work, electronically conducting metal oxide lanthanum-doped strontium titanate (LSTO) films embedded with gold nanoparticles are examined as a sensing layer for application in reducing gas flows at high temperature (600-800 °C). A strong localized surface plasmon resonance (LSPR) based response to hydrogen is demonstrated in the visible region of the spectrum, while a Drude free electron-based response is observed in the near-IR. Characteristics of these responses are studied both on planar glass substrates and on silica fibers. Charge transfer between the oxide film and the gold nanoparticles is explored as a possible mechanism governing the Au LSPR response and is considered in terms of the corresponding properties of the conducting metal oxide-based matrix phase. Principal component analysis is applied to the combined plasmonic and free-carrier based response over a range of temperatures and hydrogen concentrations. It is demonstrated that the combined visible and near-IR response of these films provides improved versatility for multiwavelength interrogation, as well as improved discrimination of important process parameters (concentration and temperature) through application of multivariate analysis techniques.

Theoretical and experimental study of temperature effect on electronic and optical properties of TiO2: comparing rutile and anatase

To gain fundamental understanding of the high-temperature optical gas-sensing and light-energy conversion materials, we comparatively investigate the temperature effects on the band gap and optical properties of rutile and anatase TiO2experimentally and theoretically. Given that the electronic structures of rutile and anatase are fundamentally different, i.e. direct band gap in rutile and indirect gap in anatase, it is not clear whether these materials exhibit different electronic structure renormalizations with temperature. Usingab initiomethods, we show that the electron-phonon interaction is the dominant factor for temperature band gap renormalization compared to the thermal expansion. As a result of different contributions from the acoustic and optical phonons, the band gap is found to widen with temperature up to 300 K, and to narrow at higher temperatures. Our calculations suggest that the band gap is narrowed by about 147 meV and 128 meV at 1000 K for rutile and anatase, respectively. Experimentally, for rutile and anatase TiO2thin films we conducted UV-Vis transmission measurements at different temperatures, and analyzed band gaps from the Tauc plots. For both TiO2phases, the band gap is found to decrease for temperature above 300 K quantitatively, agreeing with our theoretical results. The temperature effects on the dielectric functions, the refractive index, the extinction coefficient as well as the optical conductivity are also investigated. Rutile and anatase show generally similar optical properties, but differences exist in the long wavelength regime above 600 nm, where we found that the dielectric function of rutile decreases while that of anatase increases with temperature increase.

Anharmonicity Explains Temperature Renormalization Effects of the Band Gap in SrTiO3

Soft phonon modes in strongly anharmonic crystals are often neglected in calculations of phonon-related properties. Herein, we experimentally measure the temperature effects on the band gap of cubic SrTiO₃, and compare with first-principles calculations by accounting for electron-phonon coupling using harmonic and anharmonic phonon modes. The harmonic phonon modes show an increase in the band gap with temperature using either Allen-Heine-Cardona theory or finite-displacement approach, and with semilocal or hybrid exchange-correlation functionals. This finding is in contrast with experimental results that show a decrease in the band gap with temperature. We show that the disagreement can be rectified by using anharmonic phonon modes that modify the contributions not only from the significantly corrected soft modes, but also from the modes that show little correction in frequencies. Our results confirm the importance of soft-phonon modes that are often neglected in the computation of phonon-related properties and particularly in electron-phonon coupling.

Enhanced laser crystallization of thin film amorphous molybdenum disulfide (MoS2) by means of pulsed laser ultrasound

Experimental evidence is presented that pulsed laser generated ultrasound can reduce the power necessary to phase convert a nm-scale amorphous film into the crystalline phase. The amount of energy carried by pulsed ultrasound is scant when compared to the CW laser power used to crystallize but the effect is substantial. The evidence points to the extra-ordinary effects possible when a small energy perturbation is applied at a critical juncture in dynamical systems. The candidate system is MoS₂ (10 nm) sputtered on yttrium-stabilized zirconia single crystal substrate. A focused CW laser elevates the film - initially in a metastable disordered phase - to the order-disorder conversion (crystallization) temperature. Approximately 25 spot sizes removed from the heating source is a second, high repetition rate laser that induces ultrasonic excitation within the film/substrate via thermoelastic action. The processing is done on a moving stage with direct write patterning control. High resolution ex situ Raman spectroscopy, optical profilometry, and TEM are used to characterize the converted material. For this experimental configuration, we measure a 10% reduction in the heating power required to initiate crystalline formation. The measured phenomenon cannot be attributed to excess thermal energy supplied by the ultrasonic laser.