The thermal transport properties of graphene nanoribbons with central vacancy defects

Abstract Using the nonequilibrium Green’s function method, we investigated the thermal transport properties of armchair and zigzag graphene nanoribbons with central longitudinal vacancy defects, revealing intriguing phonon transport phenomena. The results indicate that these defects can effectively modulate the thermal conductance of the graphene nanoribbons. The thermal conductance gradually decreases as the width of the central longitudinal vacancy defect increases. Notably, the thermal conductance of zigzag graphene nanoribbons decreases approximately linearly with increasing defect width. Once the longitudinal vacancy defect reaches a critical size, the thermal conductance saturates and remains constant. Under a fixed defect width, temperature exerts a pronounced influence on the variation of thermal conductance. These results offer a physical model and theoretical foundation for the design of functional phononic devices.