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Title: Electron-Phonon Scattering in the Presence of Soft Modes and Electron Mobility in SrTiO 3 Perovskite from First Principles

Journal Article · · Physical Review Letters
 [1];  [2];  [1]
  1. California Inst. of Technology (CalTech), Pasadena, CA (United States)
  2. California Inst. of Technology (CalTech), Pasadena, CA (United States); Boston College, Chestnut Hill, MA (United States)

Structural phase transitions and soft phonon modes pose a longstanding challenge to computing electron-phonon (e-ph) interactions in strongly anharmonic crystals. Here we develop a first-principles approach to compute e-ph scattering and charge transport in materials with anharmonic lattice dynamics. Our approach employs renormalized phonons to compute the temperature-dependent e-ph coupling for all phonon modes, including the soft modes associated with ferroelectricity and phase transitions. We show that the electron mobility in cubic SrTiO3 is controlled by scattering with longitudinal optical phonons at room temperature and with ferroelectric soft phonons below 200 K. Our calculations can accurately predict the temperature dependence of the electron mobility in SrTiO3 between 150-300 K, and reveal the microscopic origin of its roughly T-3 trend. Our approach enables first-principles calculations of e-ph interactions and charge transport in broad classes of crystals with phase transitions and strongly anharmonic phonons.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States). National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center (NERSC)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE
Grant/Contract Number:
SC0004993; AC02-05CH11231
OSTI ID:
1544156
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1484066
Journal Information:
Physical Review Letters, Vol. 121, Issue 22; ISSN 0031-9007
Publisher:
American Physical Society (APS)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 76 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Wide Bandgap Perovskite Oxides with High Room‐Temperature Electron Mobility journal June 2019
Effect of Two‐Dimensional Crystal Orbitals on Fermi Surfaces and Electron Transport in Three‐Dimensional Perovskite Oxides journal February 2019
Effect of Two‐Dimensional Crystal Orbitals on Fermi Surfaces and Electron Transport in Three‐Dimensional Perovskite Oxides journal February 2019
First-principles calculations of charge carrier mobility and conductivity in bulk semiconductors and two-dimensional materials journal February 2020
How to resolve a phonon-associated property into contributions of basic phonon modes journal August 2019
First-principles study of transport in WO 3 journal January 2020
Spin-phonon relaxation times in centrosymmetric materials from first principles journal January 2020
First-principles calculations of charge carrier mobility and conductivity in bulk semiconductors and two-dimensional materials text January 2019