Modeling miniband for realistic silicon nanocrystal array

Abstract

Within the envelop-function framework, we developed the finite element method to calculate the minibands in the realist Silicon nanocrystal array. This method clearly reveals the miniband formation and accurately calculates the E-K dispersion relationship. In the simple 1D array, the deduced miniband structure matches well with the analytic Kronig-Penney method. More importantly, it can better simulate the 2D and 3D nanocrystal array, which avoids approximations of the quantum cubic box and the independent periodic potential of the multi-dimension Kronig-Penney method. Further, this model is utilized to calculate miniband structure of realistic 2D-array Silicon nanodisk array for guiding quantum dot solar cell design. (C) 2012 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.