Electronic Transport of Zigzag Graphene Nanoribbons with Edge Hydrogenation and Oxidation

Abstract

By using non-equilibrium Green's functions in combination with the density-functional theory, we study the effect of zigzag graphene nanoribbons with edge hydrogenation and oxidation on transport properties. We find that for the ferromagnetic (FM) configuration the ZGNRs with CH2-CH group exhibit spin diode effect in which only one spin can occur under positive bias while the other spin occurs under negative bias. In the antiferromagnetic (AF) state the symmetric ZGNRs with CH2-CH group show the spin filter effect within some specific energy windows. However, the asymmetric ZGNRs with CH2-CH group do not show such a spin filter effect. We also find that the symmetric and asymmetric ZGNRs with C2O-CH group in AF configurations show similar transport behaviors at the Fermi level. Such ZGNRs might be exploited in spintronic nanodevices.