Green's function formalism coupled with Gaussian broadening of discrete states for quantum transport: application to atomic and molecular wires.

A Green's function formalism incorporating broadened density of states (DOS) is proposed for the calculation of electrical conductance. In cluster-molecule-cluster systems, broadened DOS of the clusters are defined as continuous DOS of electrodes and used to calculate Green's function of electrodes. This approach combined with density functional theory is applied to the electrical transmission of gold atomic wires and molecular wires consisting of benzene-1,4-dithiolate, benzene-1,4-dimethanethiolate, 4,4(')-bipyridine, hexane dithiolate, and octane dithiolate. The B3LYP, B3PW91, MPW1PW91, SVWN, and BPW91 functionals with the LANL2DZ, CEP, and SDD basis sets are employed in the calculation of conductance. The width parameter was successfully determined to reproduce the quantum unit of conductance 2e(2)/h in gold atomic wires. The combination of the B3LYP hybrid functional and the CEP-31G basis set is excellent in reproducing measured conductances of molecular wires by Tao et al. [Science 301, 1221 (2003); J. Am. Chem. Soc. 125, 16164 (2003); Nano Lett. 4, 267 (2004)]. (c) 2004 American Institute of Physics.