Abstract
Antiferromagnets with exotic spin textures promise low-power spintronic devices with extremely high operating frequencies and resistance to external perturbations. In particular, the combination of highly tunable correlated electron physics, as in complex oxides, with metallicity and antiferromagnetism is desirable but exceedingly rare. LaNiO3, the lone example of a perovskite nickelate which is metallic across all temperatures, has long been a promising candidate, but the antiferromagnetic metallic state has remained elusive. We demonstrate the emergence of this state in ultrathin films of (111)-oriented LaNiO3 using a combination of polarized neutron reflectometry, low-energy muon spectroscopy and anomalous Hall effect measurements, and density functional theory calculations with a Hubbard U term. Further, we find a highly strained symmetry-breaking interfacial region which may support canting of the AFM moments leading to a vanishingly small net magnetization at the film-substrate interface, providing a convenient route toward control of the Néel order. Evidence of antiferromagnetic metallic behavior in (111)LNO films highlights the role of crystal symmetry in tuning the novel quantum states in complex oxides.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 124406 |
| Journal | Physical Review Materials |
| Volume | 8 |
| Issue number | 12 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Dec 2024 |
Funding
The research was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Director, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Division of Materials Sciences and Engineering under Contract No. DESC0008505. A portion of this research used resources at the MAGREF beamline at the Spallation Neutron Source, a DOE Office of Science User Facility operated by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Access to CANDOR was provided by the Center for High Resolution Neutron Scattering, a partnership between the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the National Science Foundation under Agreement No. DMR-2010792. Part of this work was performed at the Stanford Nano Shared Facilities (SNSF), supported by the National Science Foundation under Award No. EECS-1542152. This work is based on experiments performed at the Swiss Muon Source , Paul Scherrer Institute, Villigen, Switzerland. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Grant No. DGE-1656518. O.K. and R.P. acknowledge computational time at the Leibniz Rechnezentrum Garching, project pr87ro. Certain trade names and commercial equipment and instruments are identified to specify adequately the experimental procedure. Such identification does not imply recommendation or endorsement by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, nor does it imply that the equipment identified are necessarily the best for the purpose. The research was supported by the U.S. Department of Energy, Director, Office of Science, Office of Basic Energy Sciences, Division of Materials Sciences and Engineering under Contract No. DESC0008505. A portion of this research used resources at the MAGREF beamline at the Spallation Neutron Source, a DOE Office of Science User Facility operated by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory. Access to CANDOR was provided by the Center for High Resolution Neutron Scattering, a partnership between the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the National Science Foundation under Agreement No. DMR-2010792. Part of this work was performed at the Stanford Nano Shared Facilities (SNSF), supported by the National Science Foundation under Award No. EECS-1542152. This work is based on experiments performed at the Swiss Muon Source S\u03BCS, Paul Scherrer Institute, Villigen, Switzerland. This material is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship Grant No. DGE-1656518. O.K. and R.P. acknowledge computational time at the Leibniz Rechnezentrum Garching, project pr87ro. Certain trade names and commercial equipment and instruments are identified to specify adequately the experimental procedure. Such identification does not imply recommendation or endorsement by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, nor does it imply that the equipment identified are necessarily the best for the purpose.