Simulation of Tunnel Current in an Armchair Graphene Nanoribbon-Based p-n Diode for Undergraduate Physics Students

摘要

Simulation of tunnel current flowing in a p-n diode made from armchair graphene nanoribbons (AGNRs) was built. The diode is composed of p-type and n-type AGNRs and bandgaps of the AGNRs are obtained by using a tight binding method. The bandgaps are required to describe a potential profile having a potential barrier of the diode. Transmittance of electrons tunneling through the potential barrier is then calculated by employing Airy wavefunctions. Gaussian quadrature method, which is a numerical approximation, is used to obtain tunnel current in the diode. All steps are visualized by using the graphical user interface of Matlab.