Geometric, electronic and spectral properties of germanium and Eu-doped germanium clusters

Abstract

This study explored the geometric, electronic, and spectral properties of germanium and Eu-doped germanium clusters and compared their simulated PES spectra. The stability of Gen and EuGen nanoclusters was examined with density functional theory using FHI-aims as a software package. Symmetry-adapted cluster-configuration interaction general-R (SAC-CI-General-R) method and the SDD basis set were adopted to determine ionization energies and calculate their intensities. Natural bond orbital (NBO) calculations were performed to determine the effective molecular orbitals in the ionization and study the electron density on the nanoclusters. The shape of molecular orbitals (MO) involved in the ionization process for each structure was displayed and interpreted. The analyses of binding energies showed that increasing the size of nanoclusters leads to more stability for nanoclusters. Ionization energy and the photoelectron spectrum of these clusters indicated that Eu as an impurity reduces ionization energy and shifts the ionization processes towards infrared wavelengths. Interestingly, pure and doped clusters followed a similar pattern in terms of an increase/decrease in the first ionization energy compared to n-1 and n + 1 clusters.