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Phosphorene Nanoribbon Based Nano-Electrodes for Explosives Detection: A DFT Study

We have explored the possibility of using low dimensional phosphorene based nanoscale device for the detection of nitroaromatic based explosives. In this work, we have investigated the structural, electronic, adsorption, and quantum transport properties of phosphorene nanoribbon APNR in the presence of different nitroaromatic compounds NACs using the state-of-the-art first principle density functional theory DFT calculations. Our results reveal that the adsorption of explosive molecules is far from the APNR surface, which neither affects the structure of the explosive molecule nor the APNR surface. However, it changes the electronic energy gap due to the charge transfer between the APNR and explosive molecule. Furthermore, we have examined the transmission function and the current voltage IV characteristic curves for the APNR+explosive systems with the APNR device as a reference employing the nonequilibrium Greens function NEGFs combined with DFT approach. The different IV characteristics compared to pristine APNR device of the system in the presence of explosive molecules indicate that such APNR based device can be very much sensitive and selective towards certain explosive molecules. Hence, our study indicates that APNR material may be an attractive nanodevice for the detection of explosives.