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Title: Ab initio phonon dispersion in crystalline naphthalene using van der Waals density functionals

Journal Article · · Physical Review. B
 [1];  [2];  [3]
  1. Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States); Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
  2. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States)
  3. Lawrence Berkeley National Lab. (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States); Univ. of California, Berkeley, CA (United States). Kavli Energy NanoSciences Institute at Berkeley

Acene molecular crystals are of current interest in organic optoelectronics, both as active materials and for exploring and understanding new phenomena. Phonon scattering can be an important facilitator and dissipation mechanism in charge separation and carrier transport processes. Here, we carry out density functional theory (DFT) calculations of the structure and the full phonon dispersion of crystalline naphthalene, a well-characterized acene crystal for which detailed neutron-diffraction measurements, as well as infrared and Raman spectroscopy, are available. We evaluate the performance, relative to experiments, of DFT within the local density approximation (LDA); the generalized gradient approximation of Perdew, Burke, and Ernzerhof (PBE); and a recent van der Waals-corrected nonlocal correlation (vdW-DF-cx) functional. We find that the vdW-DF-cx functional accurately predicts lattice parameters of naphthalene within 1%. Intermolecular and intramolecular phonon frequencies across the Brillouin zone are reproduced within 7.8% and 1%, respectively. As expected, LDA (PBE) underestimates (overestimates) the lattice parameters and overestimates (underestimates) phonon frequencies, demonstrating their shortcomings for predictive calculations of weakly bound materials. If the unit cell is fixed to the experimental lattice parameters, PBE is shown to lead to improved phonon frequencies. Our study provides a detailed understanding of the phonon spectrum of naphthalene, and highlights the importance of including van der Waals dispersion interactions in predictive calculations of lattice parameters and phonon frequencies of molecular crystals and related organic materials.

Research Organization:
Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL), Berkeley, CA (United States)
Sponsoring Organization:
USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES)
Grant/Contract Number:
AC02-05CH11231
OSTI ID:
1642664
Alternate ID(s):
OSTI ID: 1253072
Journal Information:
Physical Review. B, Vol. 93, Issue 19; ISSN 2469-9950
Publisher:
American Physical Society (APS)Copyright Statement
Country of Publication:
United States
Language:
English
Citation Metrics:
Cited by: 34 works
Citation information provided by
Web of Science

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Cited By (5)

Extent of Fock-exchange mixing for a hybrid van der Waals density functional? journal May 2018
Impact of Low‐Frequency Vibrations on Charge Transport in High‐Mobility Organic Semiconductors journal December 2018
Charge transport in organic molecular semiconductors from first principles: The bandlike hole mobility in a naphthalene crystal journal March 2018
Filter function of graphene oxide: Trapping perfluorinated molecules journal January 2020
Extent of Fock-exchange mixing for a hybrid van der Waals density functional? text January 2018