Atomistic Simulation of Realistically Sized Nanodevices Using NEMO 3-D—Part II: Applications

In part I, the development and deployment of a general nanoelectronic modeling tool (NEMO 3-D) has been discussed. Based on the atomistic valence-force field and the sp³d⁵s* nearest neighbor tight-binding models, NEMO 3-D enables the computation of strain and electronic structure in nanostructures consisting of more than 64 and 52 million atoms, corresponding to volumes of (110 nm)³ and (101 nm)³, respectively. In this part, successful applications of NEMO 3-D are demonstrated in the atomistic calculation of single-particle electronic states of the following realistically sized nanostructures: 1) self-assembled quantum dots (QDs) including long-range strain and piezoelectricity; 2) stacked quantum dot system as used in quantum cascade lasers; 3) SiGe quantum wells (QWs) for quantum computation; and 4) SiGe nanowires. These examples demonstrate the broad NEMO 3-D capabilities and indicate the necessity of multimillion atomistic electronic structure modeling.