Coherent Transport in Y-Junction Graphene Waveguide

Abstract

We performed a series of theoretical transport studies on Y-branch electron waveguides which are embedded in mid-size armchair graphene nanoribbons (AGNRs). Non-equilibrium Greens function (NEGF) with different approximations of tight-binding (TB) Hamiltonian has been employed. Using the first nearest hopping approximation, we observed very pronounced conductance quantization, the structure of which depends on geometrical design and shows a spacing of $4e^2/h$, indicating the existence of valley degree of freedom. Moreover, by incorporating the third nearest approximation, we observed seminal plateaus deviated from multiples of $4e^2/h$ conductance, suggesting the lift of valley degeneracy. Finally, Quasi-one dimensional band structure calculations have been performed to study the availability of energy channels and the role of the major geometrical parameters on the transport.