Excitonic effects in the optical properties of alkaline earth chalcogenides from first-principles calculations

Abstract

This paper studies excitonic effects in the optical properties of alkaline earth chalcogenides (AECs) by solving the equation of motion of the two-particle Green function, the Bethe–Salpeter equation (BSE). On the basis of quasi-particle states obtained by the GW approximation, (BSE + GW), the solution of BSE improves agreement with experiments. In these compounds, the main excitonic structures were reproduced appropriately. In the optical absorption spectra of AECs, the main excitonic structures originate in the direct transitions at X and Γ symmetry points, as confirmed by the experiments. In addition to real and imaginary parts of the dielectric functions, excitonic effects were studied in the electron energy loss functions of AECs. Moreover, the G0W0 approximation was used in order to determine the energy band gaps of AECs. This showed that except for MgO and BaO, the other AECs under study have indirect band gaps from Γ to X.