Vacancy-induced elastic properties and hardness of CrB4: A DFT calculation

Abstract

Vacancy plays a crucial role in mechanical properties of transition metal borides (TMBs). However, the influence of vacancy on hardness of TMBs is unknown. In this paper, the relationship between boron vacancy and mechanical properties of CrB4 is investigated by first-principle calculations. Two different vacancies including boron monovacancy (MV) and boron bivacancy (BV) are considered. We find that CrB4 with boron MV is more stable than that of boron BV. The removed atom weakens the deformation resistances, and reduces the elastic stiffness and hardness. The calculated shear modulus, Young’s modulus and theoretical hardness of boron MV are larger than that of boron BV. The reason is that the removed atom weakens the localized hybridization between B and B atoms, and damages the 3D-network B–B covalent bond. However, the bulk modulus of B[Formula: see text] is slightly larger than that of perfect CrB4. This reason is attributed to the formation of triangular pyramid bonding in B[Formula: see text] vacancy.