First-principles study of cobalt pnictides: Example compound SrCo$_{2}$N$_{2}$

Although it has been known for several decades that many materials with chemical form AT$_{2}$X$_{2}$ (A = alkaline earth element or lanthanide, T = transition metal, X = an element of groups IIIB-VIB) crystallize with the same structure, it was only recently that interest was renewed in these materials with the discovery that BaFe$_{2}$As$_{2}$ can be made to superconductor at temperatures as high as 38 K. Although the precise mechanism of superconductivity has yet to be determined, there is a growing interest in the study of materials that have similar electronic properties to BaFe$_{2}$As$_{2}$. In our work, we employ density functional theory in the local density approximation in order to study the isochemically substituted variant, SrCo$_{2}$N$_{2}$. In this work, we determine both the stability of SrCo$_{2}$N$_{2}$ as well as how the substitution changes the electronic properties in comparison to BaFe$_{2}$As$_{2}$.