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Science and the careers of scientists generally advance by papers published in journals reporting scientific work. The quality of either depends on the number of citations to papers in a journal or published by a given scientist, respectively. For the scientist, the general assumption is getting published in better journals improve scientist's chance of being read and cited.
Journals are very similar in their editorial style that authors must observe. With small variations these are abstract, only new material, summary of new results after introduction, figures and table aptly capturing principal results. Clear prose is desired but not required.
Express journals want the “best new ” work written to tight rules: length, summary of new results near start of paper (often in addition to an abstract). [e.g, PRL, APL, Nature, Science,...]
Archive journals accept longer papers of new work (i.e., work not in earlier express paper) written in style set by journals. [e.g., PRB, JAP, Science, Nature, ...] Biggest variation is where method is described and typical length desired.
Scientist must pick the right journal for their paper.
Alternately, those,desiring to publish in the “best”
journal, must pick an area --generally new and hot-- so that their
good work will be published there.
The latter route, commonly chosen, divert many into “hot”
fields. [quantum Hall Effect, anomalous Hall effect (with no magnetic
field), high temperature superconductors, iron-based high-temperature
superconductors, nanophysics, graphene].
1. Ideally THM should be captured by Figure and its Caption.
Figure should drag Reader to paper. Abstracts can do that if it
is well written. So few are that journals commission short descriptions
to pull reader into best papers. These descriptions and commissioned
figures are often clearer than paper
2. Figure. Prepare first; must deliver the THM. If one figure will do the job, don't prepare more.
3. Figure captions should stand on its
own--delivering the THM.
General rule. Caption starts with a
label that is not a sentence. The rest should be sentences.
23-b. Tables: use only if a figure can't capture the most important results.
4. Equations. Avoid. If use, explain the physics of all symbols before displaying the equation.
5. References. Make sure you find the ones that reader will find useful.
6. Topic Sentences. Each with known “character” drives with strong, active, present-tense verb to new material that is explained in paragraph.
7. Estimate length, assuming 2-3 paragraphs (TSs) per page. May need to include abstract, figure, table, equations and references in computing length. If too long, revise and cut.
8. Revise and cut. Review topic sentence outline to check each TS is needed and in correct order to deliver THM. Often you can rearrange or cut. Sacrifice all that doesn't drive to THM.
Paper in question: Accurate ab-initio prediction of III-IV direct-indirect gap crossovers, Jeremy W Nicklas and J W Wilkins, Applied Physics Letters 97, 091902 (2010). Don't worry about title.
Motivation. Semiconductors --central to all electronics-- are
small gap insulators that conduct when lightly doped with other elements.
The standard theory fails to predict the gap.
First
tranistor (1947) used germanium. If still true, there would be
no theory, as it predicts Ge is a metal.
For more than four years, my group has been using a new approach (HSE) to predict gaps for semiconductor alloys. With our first success, we wanted to get in print: first two papers would demonstrate method worked not only for alloys but also for alloys used in heterostructures (i.e,, device geometry).
Here is first try to cram everything into one figure. Well?
.
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These two figures contrast "stripped" figure and full one. Which works better? (a)Compares measured bandgap of AlxGa1-xGa versus concentration of Al against that predicted by our preferred approach (HSE) and standard in the field (PBE). The words Direct and Indirect. When the gap is Direct the material is approriate for optoelectronic use; Indirect is not. The vertical arrows indicate direction relevant to crystal axes along with bandgap is measured. (b) Supplies all the data of calculation and experiment. |
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Abstract We report the compositional dependence of the
electronic band structure for a range of III-V alloys. Standard density
functional theory is insufficient to mimic the electronic gap energies
at different symmetry points of the Brillouin zone. The HSE hybrid
functional with screened exchange accurately reproduces the experimental
bandgaps and, more importantly, the alloy concentration of the
direct-indirect gap crossovers for the III-V alloys studied here:
AlGaAs, InAlAs, AlInP, InGaP, and GaAsP.
[There is a supplement with additional info but reader only
learns that in footnote.]
The “bandgap vs lattice constant" map is a popular model used to aid in the design of all optoelectronic devices but suffers from inaccuracies in bandgap energies and crossover compositions where the alloy switches from a direct gap to an indirect gap.
We report HSE reproduces not only the bandgaps across the entire
composition range of each alloy studied here but also the
direct-indirect bandgap crossovers seen experimentally.
Last sentence of second paragraph.
Figure 1(a) demonstrates this significant improvement of HSE over PBE in predicting the direct-indirect (Γ-X) crossover (denoted by vertical arrows) for the AlGaAs alloy compared with experiment.
--------- method section starts; other journals put at end
The disordered zinc-blende (cubic) alloys are best modeled by special quasirandom structures (SQS), ordered structures designed to reproduce the most important pair-correlation functions of a random alloy.
Table I gives the lattice vectors for each SQS used to describe the optical transitions as seen in the zinc-blende primitive cell through folding relations in the Brillouin zone.
The calculations are performed using the projector augmented-wave (PAW) method.
The lattice constants are linearly interpolated between the experimental parent compound lattice constants taken from Vurgaftman.
-------------- end of method section (more in supplement)
Figure 1(b) supplements (a) by showing the computed direct gap (Gamma_c -> Gamma_v) and indirect gap (X_c -> Gamma_v), conduction to valence band energies, across the entire composition range of AlGaAs.
For AlxIn(1-x}As, Figure 2(a) displays the bandgap energy for both HSE, PBE, and the recommended experimental bowing parameters.
For AlxIn(1-x}P, Figure 2(b), HSE predicts a crossover at 37% Al concentration underestimating the experimental value by Onton but shows relatively good agreement with the recent results of strained AlInP by Ishitani.
For GaxIn(1-x}P, Figure 2(c), experiments utilizing optical luminescence measurements see only a single Gamma$-X cossover, whereas high pressure electrical measurements and piezoreflectance measurements observed two-point crossovers for Gamma-L and L-X two point crossovers.
For GaAs(1-y)P, Figure 2(d), both HSE and PBE predict a two-point crossover; whereas experiments which rely on optical luminescence observe only a single point Gamma-X crossover at x=0.45.
To conclude, HSE reproduces direct-indirect crossovers within 12% atomic composition for the alloys studied here with the largest difference being for GaAsP, whereas PBE overestimates crossover points by 39% atomic composition.
Why do I think this is a good paper? APL is one of the top 10
journals in all fields, by Page Rank.
[J Bio Chem, Science,
PNAS, PRL, Cell, NewEng J Medicine, JACS, J Immunol, APL]
It was accepted with only small changes requested as was the paper on heterostructures.
It solved a long-standing problemo
What do I think this is a good paper.
It solved a long-standing problem. Theorists largely ignored it, and experimentalists largely ignored theory.
APL is one of the top 10 journals in all fields, by Page Rank.
[J Bio Chem, Science, PNAS, PRL, Cell, NewEng J Medicine,
JACS, J Immunol, APL]
It was accepted with only small changes (e.g., request for more references) as was the paper on heterostructures.