Electronic and Magnetic Properties of Bulk and Monolayer CrSi2: A First-Principle Study

We investigated the electronic and magnetic properties of bulk and monolayer CrSi2 using first-principle methods based on spin-polarized density functional theory. The phonon dispersion, electronic structures, and magnetism of bulk and monolayer CrSi2 were scientifically studied. Calculated phonon dispersion curves indicated that both bulk and monolayer CrSi2 were structurally stable. Our calculations revealed that bulk CrSi2 was an indirect gap nonmagnetic semiconductor, with 0.376 eV band gap. However, monolayer CrSi2 had metallic and ferromagnetic (FM) characters. Both surface and confinement effects played an important role in the metallic behavior of monolayer CrSi2. In addition, we also calculated the magnetic moment of unit cell of 2D multilayer CrSi2 nanosheets with different layers. The results showed that magnetism of CrSi2 nanosheets was attributed to band energy between layers, quantum size, and surface effects.