Tetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy deposited on metallic MnN underlayers using amorphous substrates
Tetragonal Heusler compounds that exhibit large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy are promising materials for advanced spintronic devices. A prerequisite are thin films whose tetragonal axis is oriented perpendicular to the plane of the films. Here we show that highly textured, (001) oriented, tetra...
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Online Access: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.5066594 |
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doaj-a79501dcf5994222ae27d027275f9eda2020-11-24T22:15:43ZengAIP Publishing LLCAPL Materials2166-532X2019-03-0173031103031103-810.1063/1.5066594002903APMTetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy deposited on metallic MnN underlayers using amorphous substratesYari Ferrante0Jaewoo Jeong1Rana Saha2Sergey V. Faleev3Mahesh G. Samant4Teya Topuria5Hakan Deniz6Stuart S. P. Parkin7IBM Research—Almaden, San Jose, California 95120, USAIBM Research—Almaden, San Jose, California 95120, USAMax-Planck Institute for Microstructure Physics, 06120 Halle (Saale), GermanyMax-Planck Institute for Microstructure Physics, 06120 Halle (Saale), GermanyIBM Research—Almaden, San Jose, California 95120, USAIBM Research—Almaden, San Jose, California 95120, USAMax-Planck Institute for Microstructure Physics, 06120 Halle (Saale), GermanyIBM Research—Almaden, San Jose, California 95120, USATetragonal Heusler compounds that exhibit large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy are promising materials for advanced spintronic devices. A prerequisite are thin films whose tetragonal axis is oriented perpendicular to the plane of the films. Here we show that highly textured, (001) oriented, tetragonal Mn3Sn layers can be prepared using metallic zinc-blende (ZB) MnN as underlayers. Moreover, we show that these layers can be deposited on amorphous substrates using reactive magnetron sputtering. The ferrimagnetic Mn3Sn layers exhibit perpendicularly magnetized hysteresis loops with coercive fields of ∼2 T. Stoichiometric ZB-MnN underlayers share an “equivalent” Mn-Mn layer at the interface with Mn3Sn, thus promoting their oriented growth. Other nitride underlayers are not effective due to their rock-salt (RS) crystal structure and the absence of Mn. Density functional theory calculations confirm that tetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films are energetically stable when interfaced with ZB-MnN underlayers and not with any of the other RS nitride underlayers considered here. Such Heusler compounds have much promise as electrodes for magnetic tunnel junction memory elements for deeply scaled magnetic random access memories.http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.5066594 |
collection |
DOAJ |
language |
English |
format |
Article |
sources |
DOAJ |
author |
Yari Ferrante Jaewoo Jeong Rana Saha Sergey V. Faleev Mahesh G. Samant Teya Topuria Hakan Deniz Stuart S. P. Parkin |
spellingShingle |
Yari Ferrante Jaewoo Jeong Rana Saha Sergey V. Faleev Mahesh G. Samant Teya Topuria Hakan Deniz Stuart S. P. Parkin Tetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy deposited on metallic MnN underlayers using amorphous substrates APL Materials |
author_facet |
Yari Ferrante Jaewoo Jeong Rana Saha Sergey V. Faleev Mahesh G. Samant Teya Topuria Hakan Deniz Stuart S. P. Parkin |
author_sort |
Yari Ferrante |
title |
Tetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy deposited on metallic MnN underlayers using amorphous substrates |
title_short |
Tetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy deposited on metallic MnN underlayers using amorphous substrates |
title_full |
Tetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy deposited on metallic MnN underlayers using amorphous substrates |
title_fullStr |
Tetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy deposited on metallic MnN underlayers using amorphous substrates |
title_full_unstemmed |
Tetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy deposited on metallic MnN underlayers using amorphous substrates |
title_sort |
tetragonal mn3sn heusler films with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy deposited on metallic mnn underlayers using amorphous substrates |
publisher |
AIP Publishing LLC |
series |
APL Materials |
issn |
2166-532X |
publishDate |
2019-03-01 |
description |
Tetragonal Heusler compounds that exhibit large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy are promising materials for advanced spintronic devices. A prerequisite are thin films whose tetragonal axis is oriented perpendicular to the plane of the films. Here we show that highly textured, (001) oriented, tetragonal Mn3Sn layers can be prepared using metallic zinc-blende (ZB) MnN as underlayers. Moreover, we show that these layers can be deposited on amorphous substrates using reactive magnetron sputtering. The ferrimagnetic Mn3Sn layers exhibit perpendicularly magnetized hysteresis loops with coercive fields of ∼2 T. Stoichiometric ZB-MnN underlayers share an “equivalent” Mn-Mn layer at the interface with Mn3Sn, thus promoting their oriented growth. Other nitride underlayers are not effective due to their rock-salt (RS) crystal structure and the absence of Mn. Density functional theory calculations confirm that tetragonal Mn3Sn Heusler films are energetically stable when interfaced with ZB-MnN underlayers and not with any of the other RS nitride underlayers considered here. Such Heusler compounds have much promise as electrodes for magnetic tunnel junction memory elements for deeply scaled magnetic random access memories. |
url |
http://dx.doi.org/10.1063/1.5066594 |
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