Professor Thorsten Hesjedal FInstP

Abstract:

After the discovery of Dirac fermions in graphene, it has become a natural question to ask whether it is possible to realize Dirac fermions in other two-dimensional (2D) materials as well. In this work, we report the discovery of multiple Dirac-like electronic bands in ultrathin Ge flms grown on Au(1 1 1) by angle-resolved photoelectron spectroscopy. By tuning the thickness of the flms, we are able to observe the evolution of their electronic structure when passing through the monolayer limit. Our discovery may signify the synthesis of germanene, a 2D honeycomb structure made of Ge, which is a promising platform for exploring exotic topological phenomena and enabling potential applications.

Abstract:

We present a structural and density functional theory study of FexCu1-xSe within the three-dimensional topological insulator Bi2Te3. The FexCu1-xSe inclusions are single-crystalline and epitaxially oriented with respect to the Bi2Te3 thin film. Aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy and electron energy loss spectroscopy show an atomically-sharp FexCu1-xSe/Bi2Te3 interface. The FexCu1-xSe /Bi2Te3 interface is determined by Se-Te bonds and no misfit dislocations are observed, despite the different lattice symmetries and large lattice mismatch of ∼ 19%. First-principle calculations show that the large strain at the FexCu1-xSe /Bi2Te3 interface can be accommodated via van der Waals-like bonding between Se and Te atoms.

Abstract:

Epitaxial-grown DyFe2/YFe2 multilayer thin films form an ideal model system for the study of magnetic exchange springs. Here the DyFe2 (YFe2) layers are magnetically hard (soft). In the presence of a magnetic field, exchange springs form in the YFe2 layers. Recently, it has been demonstrated that placing small amounts of Er into the centre of the YFe2 springs generates substantial changes in magnetic behavior. In particular, (i) the number of exchange-spring states is increased dramatically, (ii) the resulting domain-wall states cannot simply be described as either Néel or Bloch walls, (iii) the Er and Dy magnetic loops are strikingly different, and (iv) it is possible to engineer Er-induced magnetic exchange-spring collapse. Here, results are presented for Er-doped (110)-oriented DyFe2 (60 Å/YFe2(240 Å)15 multilayer films, at 100 K in fields of up to 12 T. In particular, we contrast magnetic loops for fields applied along seemingly equivalent hard-magnetic [110]-type axes. MBE-grown cubic Laves thin films offer the unique feature of allowing to apply the magnetic field along (i) a hard out-of-plane [110]-axis (the growth axis) and (ii) a similar hard in-plane [110]-axis. Differences are found and attributed to the competition between the crystal-field interaction at the Er site and the long-range dipole-dipole interaction. In particular, the out-of-plane [110] Er results show the existence of a new magnetic exchange spring state, which would be very difficult to identify without the aid of element-specific technique of X-ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD).