Professor Turan Birol
University of Minnesota
Friday, November 15
11:00 a.m.
Room 214 S. W. Mudd

Increasing reproducibility of first principles methods and availability of higher computer power made first principles calculations an integral part of solid state physics and materials science. Not only is it now possible to support and reproduce experimental observations ab initio, but it is also common to solve the inverse band structure problem to perform materials by design, i.e. to predict yet-to-be-synthesized compounds with desired electronic functionalities.
In this talk I am going to discuss some of my group's recent efforts to perform correlated materials design, and more specifically, design a transition metal oxide that is both metallic and transparent to visible spectrum. Vanadate perovskites such as SrVO3 have been proposed for this application, and it was shown that the electronic correlations is essential for their optical transparency [Zhang et al., Nat. Comm. 15, 204 (2016)]. Reproducing these electronic correlations require theoretical tools that go beyond the commonly used workhorse of materials simulations, the density functional theory (DFT). After a brief introduction of one such method, the Dynamical Mean Field Theory (DMFT), I will explore how DFT+DMFT can be used to design novel compounds that can be used as transparent conductors. Specific examples will include vanadates and niobates, and their double perovskites which are so-called Hund's metals. I'll conclude by a discussion on the effect of cation order on the electronic correlations in these compounds.
Bio: Turan Birol received his BS degree in Physics from the Middle East Technical University before moving to US for his PhD. He did his PhD in Craig Fennie's group at Cornell University, and spent 3 years at Rutgers University as a condensed matter theory group postdoc before moving to the University of Minnesota as an assistant professor in 2016. His research interests span a wide range of topics in solid state and materials physics including ferroelectricity, frustrated magnetism, and correlated electronic materials.