Impact of van der Waals corrected functionals on monolayer GeSe polymorphs: An in-depth exploration

A comprehensive ab initio calculations were conducted to analyze the structural, electronic, elastic, and phonon characteristics of monolayer GeSe polymorphs, utilizing various van der Waals corrections. The physical properties of layered GeSe polymorphs were investigated using the Perdew-Burke-Ernzerhof exchange–correlation functional, implemented within a generalized gradient approximation. The study presents findings on the effects of the DFT-D3 and DFT-D3(BJ) functionals with Grimme correction on the ground state properties, with a focus on weak van der Waals interactions. The mechanical and dynamic stability of monolayer GeSe polymorphs is indicated by the analysis of the elastic constants and phonon dispersion curves. Monolayer GeSe polymorphs are found to have an indirect band gap semiconductor structure using HSE06 for the considered phases. The band gaps of these polymorphs are predicted to range from approximately 0.95 to 2.47 eV, which falls within a highly useful energy range for practical applications. Additionally, this study is the first to investigate the anisotropic mechanical properties of these materials.