Electronic structure, chemical bonding and elastic properties of the first thorium‐containing nitride perovskite TaThN₃

Abstract

Abstract The full‐potential linearized augmented plane wave method with the generalized gradient approximation for the exchange and correlation potential (LAPW‐GGA) is used to understand the electronic and elastic properties of the first thorium‐containing nitride perovskite TaThN 3 . Total and partial density of states, charge distributions as well as the elastic constants, bulk modulus, compressibility, shear modulus, Young modulus and Poisson ratio are obtained for the first time and analyzed in comparison with cubic ThN. The chemical bonding in TaThN 3 is a combination of ionic Th–N and of mixed covalent–ionic Ta–N bonds. The cubic TaThN 3 is semiconducting with the direct gap at about 0.65 eV. (© 2007 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)