Border effect in the Cr₂Ge₂Te₆ nanoribbons: a stability study through Density Functional Theory

The Cr₂Ge₂Te₆ compound is an intrinsic ferromagnetic material with a van der Waals layered structure that shows great promise in spintronic applications. In this work, we investigated the edge effect in the formation of Cr₂Ge₂Te₆ nanoribbons with different edges as well as the change in electronic and magnetic properties, by spin-polarized calculations. We study the thermodynamic stability of the nanoribbon employing the surface formation energy formalism. According to the calculations, at Ge- and Te-poor conditions and Ge-poor Te-rich conditions, the nanoribbon terminated in Te-Cr is the most stable structure, also, at the limits Te- and Ge-rich conditions and Ge-rich Te-poor conditions, the most stable structure corresponds to a combination of Cr-Te and Te-Ge edges.