Theoretical study of hydrogen adsorption on the GaN(0001) surface

Ab initio density functional theory, using the B3LYP hybrid functional with all-electron basis sets, has been applied to the adsorption of H on the (0001) surface of wurtzite GaN. For bulk GaN, good agreement is obtained with photoemission and X-ray emission data for the valence band and for the Ga 3d and N 2s shallow core levels. A band gap of Eg = 4.14 eV is computed vs the experimental value (at 0 K) of 3.50 eV. A simple model, consisting of a (2 · 2) structure with 3/4-monolayer (ML) of adsorbed H, is found to yield a density of states in poor agreement with photoemission data for H adsorbed on surfaces prepared by ion bombardment and annealing. A new model, consisting of co-adsorbed Ga (1/4 ML) and H (1/2 ML), is proposed to account for these data. 2004 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.