Detecting magnetic ordering with atomic size electron probes
- Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Center for Nanophase Materials Science (CNMS)
- Uppsala Univ. (Sweden). Dept. Physics and Astronomy
- Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Materials Science & Technology Division
- Oak Ridge National Lab. (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Computational Sciences and Engineering Division
While magnetism originates at the atomic scale, the existing spectroscopic techniques sensitive to magnetic signals only produce spectra with spatial resolution on a larger scale. However, recently, it has been theoretically argued that atomic size electron probes with customized phase distributions can detect magnetic circular dichroism. Here, we report a direct experimental real-space detection of magnetic circular dichroism in aberration-corrected scanning transmission electron microscopy (STEM). Using an atomic size-aberrated electron probe with a customized phase distribution, we reveal the checkerboard antiferromagnetic ordering of Mn moments in LaMnAsO by observing a dichroic signal in the Mn L-edge. The novel experimental setup presented here, which can easily be implemented in aberration-corrected STEM, opens new paths for probing dichroic signals in materials with unprecedented spatial resolution.
- Research Organization:
- Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL), Oak Ridge, TN (United States). Center for Nanophase Materials Sciences (CNMS)
- Sponsoring Organization:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES); Swedish Research Council (SRC); Goran Gustafsson Foundation; Swedish National Infrastructure for Computing
- Grant/Contract Number:
- AC05-00OR22725
- OSTI ID:
- 1311213
- Journal Information:
- Advanced Structural and Chemical Imaging, Vol. 2, Issue 1; ISSN 2198-0926
- Publisher:
- SpringerCopyright Statement
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
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