Impact of van der Waal’s interaction in the hybrid bilayer of silicene/SiC

Electronic structure calculations based on density functional theory find a presence of noticeable interlayer van der Waal interaction in a hybrid bilayer consisting of a silicene and SiC monolayer sheet with the binding energy of 45 meV per atom. This interlayer interaction also leads to significant changes in the nature of chemical bonding, thereby inducing a curvature in the erstwhile planar SiC sheet. Subsequently, modifications in charge distribution at the interface produce a dissimilar chemical environment for two sub lattices of silicene which opens the band gap in the heterogeneous bilayer system. Application of an external electric field is found to linearly modulate the band gap of the silicene/SiC bilayer indicating its potential use in nanoscale devices.