Unveiling the Electronic Structure of SnS for Photocatalytic Applications: A DFT Approach^†

Abstract

Photocatalytic materials are of great scientific interest due to their potential applications in sustainable energy sources. Band gap and optical absorption of the materials are two core characteristics for photocatalysis that eventually depend on electronic structure. In order to accurately compute (predict) the electronic‐scale properties of a crystalline solid using first principles calculations, which might be costly to measure experimentally, large‐scale atomic level calculation frameworks have been made possible through the use of density functional theory (DFT). We have used DFT with many body perturbation theory (MBPT) by solving the bethe‐salpeter equation (BSE) to priorly predict the properties of bulk tin sulfide (SnS) as it meets the necessary requirements for photocatalytic applications. We fixed the DFT band gap underestimation by including the Hubbard parameter (U) and used projector augmented wave pseudo‐potentials with generalized‐gradient approximation (GGA) to calculate the electronic and optical properties of SnS. Optical properties were computed using independent particle approximation (IPA) and BSE with DFT+U wave functions. Our theoretical results align with experimental data for this material, demonstrating the potential for further research in validating experimental results with theoretical approximations and empirical relations.