First-principles study of the interaction and charge transfer between graphene and metals

Measuring the transport of electrons through a graphene sheet necessarily involves contacting it with metal electrodes. We study the adsorption of graphene on metal substrates using first-principles calculations at the level of density functional theory. The bonding of graphene to Al, Ag, Cu, Au and Pt(111) surfaces is so weak that its unique "ultrarelativistic" electronic structure is preserved. The interaction does, however, lead to a charge transfer that shifts the Fermi level by up to 0.5 eV with respect to the conical points. The crossover from p-type to n-type doping occurs for a metal with a work function ~5.4 eV, a value much larger than the work function of free-standing graphene, 4.5 eV. We develop a simple analytical model that describes the Fermi level shift in graphene in terms of the metal substrate work function. Graphene interacts with and binds more strongly to Co, Ni, Pd and Ti. This chemisorption involves hybridization between graphene $p_z$-states and metal d-states that opens a band gap in graphene. The graphene work function is as a result reduced considerably. In a current-in-plane device geometry this should lead to n-type doping of graphene.Comment: 12 pages, 9 figure

Theory for Magnetism and Triplet Superconductivity in LiFeAs

Superconducting pnictides are widely found to feature spin-singlet pairing in the vicinity of an antiferromagnetic phase, for which nesting between electron and hole Fermi surfaces is crucial. LiFeAs differs from the other pnictides by (i) poor nesting properties and (ii) unusually shallow hole pockets. Investigating magnetic and pairing instabilities in an electronic model that incorporates these differences, we find antiferromagnetic order to be absent. Instead we observe almost ferromagnetic fluctuations which drive an instability toward spin-triplet p-wave superconductivity.Comment: Published versio

Finite temperature spin-dynamics and phase transitions in spin-orbital models

We study finite temperature properties of a generic spin-orbital model relevant to transition metal compounds, having coupled quantum Heisenberg-spin and Ising-orbital degrees of freedom. The model system undergoes a phase transition, consistent with that of a 2D Ising model, to an orbitally ordered state at a temperature set by short-range magnetic order. At low temperatures the orbital degrees of freedom freeze-out and the model maps on to a quantum Heisenberg model. The onset of orbital excitations causes a rapid scrambling of the spin spectral weight away from coherent spin-waves, which leads to a sharp increase in uniform magnetic susceptibility just below the phase transition, reminiscent of the observed behavior in the Fe-pnictide materials.Comment: 4 page

Dipole Oscillations in Bose - Fermi Mixture in the Time-Dependent Grosspitaevskii and Vlasov equations

We study the dipole collective oscillations in the bose-fermi mixture using a dynamical time-dependent approach, which are formulated with the time-dependent Gross-Pitaevskii equation and the Vlasov equation. We find big difference in behaviors of fermion oscillation between the time-dependent approach and usual approaches such as the random-phase approximation and the sum-rule approach. While the bose gas oscillates monotonously, the fermion oscillation shows a beat and a damping. When the amplitude is not minimal, the dipole oscillation of the fermi gas cannot be described with a simple center-of-mass motion.Comment: 17 pages text, and 15 figure

Diamond electro-optomechanical resonators integrated in nanophotonic circuits

Diamond integrated photonic devices are promising candidates for emerging applications in nanophotonics and quantum optics. Here we demonstrate active modulation of diamond nanophotonic circuits by exploiting mechanical degrees of freedom in free-standing diamond electro-optomechanical resonators. We obtain high quality factors up to 9600, allowing us to read out the driven nanomechanical response with integrated optical interferometers with high sensitivity. We are able to excite higher order mechanical modes up to 115 MHz and observe the nanomechanical response also under ambient conditions.Comment: 15 pages, 4 figure

Exotic fermion multiplets as a solution to baryon asymmetry, dark matter and neutrino masses

We propose an extension to the standard model where three exotic fermion 5-plets and one scalar 6-plet are added to the particle content. By demanding that all interactions are renormalizable and standard model gauge invariant, we show that the lightest exotic particle in this model can be a dark matter candidate as long as the new 6-plet scalar does not develop a nonzero vacuum expectation value. Furthermore, light neutrino masses are generated radiatively at one-loop while the baryon asymmetry is produced by the CP-violating decays of the second lightest exotic particle. We have demonstrated using concrete examples that there is a parameter space where a consistent solution to the problems of baryon asymmetry, dark matter and neutrino masses can be obtained.Comment: 17 pages, 2 figures (REVTeX4.1), v2: some refs added, v3: typos corrected, Sec.VI.B, C modified, this version to appear in PR