Ultrathin interfacial layer with suppressed room temperature magnetization in magnesium aluminum ferrite thin films
Abstract
Low-damping magnetic oxide thin films with small thicknesses are essential for efficient insulator spintronic devices, particularly those driven by spin torque effects. Here, we investigate the depth-resolved compositional and magnetic properties of epitaxial spinel MgAl0.5Fe1.5O4 (MAFO), which has recently been reported as a promising low-damping insulator. We find that ≈11nm films exhibit optimal Gilbert damping, with a typical damping parameter of 0.001. While defects due to strain relaxation in the bulk of the film contribute to increased damping for large film thickness, the damping increase in thinner films is attributed to the presence of a chemically disordered magnetic dead layer at the film/substrate interface. This interfacial dead layer arises from an Fe-deficient MAFO layer. Notably, this layer is only about one-sixth the thickness of that found at the interface between yttrium iron garnet films and gadolinium gallium garnet substrates, making MAFO an ideal thin-film insulator for spin-torque applications.
- Authors:
-
- Stanford Univ., CA (United States)
- Virginia Polytechnic Inst. and State Univ. (Virginia Tech), Blacksburg, VA (United States)
- Stanford Univ., CA (United States). Geballe Lab. for Advanced Materials
- Air Force Research Lab. (AFRL), Wright-Patterson AFB, OH (United States)
- National Inst. of Standards and Technology (NIST), Gaithersburg, MD (United States). Center for Neutron Research
- Publication Date:
- Research Org.:
- Stanford Univ., CA (United States)
- Sponsoring Org.:
- USDOE Office of Science (SC); US Department of the Navy, Office of Naval Research (ONR); National Science Foundation (NSF); US Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR); USDOE Office of Science (SC), Basic Energy Sciences (BES). Materials Sciences & Engineering Division
- OSTI Identifier:
- 1611065
- Alternate Identifier(s):
- OSTI ID: 1566175
- Grant/Contract Number:
- SC0008505; N00014-15-1-0045
- Resource Type:
- Accepted Manuscript
- Journal Name:
- Applied Physics Letters
- Additional Journal Information:
- Journal Volume: 115; Journal Issue: 13; Journal ID: ISSN 0003-6951
- Publisher:
- American Institute of Physics (AIP)
- Country of Publication:
- United States
- Language:
- English
- Subject:
- 71 CLASSICAL AND QUANTUM MECHANICS, GENERAL PHYSICS; 36 MATERIALS SCIENCE; 75 CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY; physics; low loss; spin current; oxide films
Citation Formats
Wisser, Jacob J., Emori, Satoru, Riddiford, Lauren, Altman, Aaron, Li, Peng, Mahalingam, Krishnamurthy, Urwin, Brittany T., Howe, Brandon M., Page, Michael R., Grutter, Alexander J., Kirby, Brian J., and Suzuki, Yuri. Ultrathin interfacial layer with suppressed room temperature magnetization in magnesium aluminum ferrite thin films. United States: N. p., 2019.
Web. doi:10.1063/1.5111326.
Wisser, Jacob J., Emori, Satoru, Riddiford, Lauren, Altman, Aaron, Li, Peng, Mahalingam, Krishnamurthy, Urwin, Brittany T., Howe, Brandon M., Page, Michael R., Grutter, Alexander J., Kirby, Brian J., & Suzuki, Yuri. Ultrathin interfacial layer with suppressed room temperature magnetization in magnesium aluminum ferrite thin films. United States. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5111326
Wisser, Jacob J., Emori, Satoru, Riddiford, Lauren, Altman, Aaron, Li, Peng, Mahalingam, Krishnamurthy, Urwin, Brittany T., Howe, Brandon M., Page, Michael R., Grutter, Alexander J., Kirby, Brian J., and Suzuki, Yuri. Tue .
"Ultrathin interfacial layer with suppressed room temperature magnetization in magnesium aluminum ferrite thin films". United States. https://doi.org/10.1063/1.5111326. https://www.osti.gov/servlets/purl/1611065.
@article{osti_1611065,
title = {Ultrathin interfacial layer with suppressed room temperature magnetization in magnesium aluminum ferrite thin films},
author = {Wisser, Jacob J. and Emori, Satoru and Riddiford, Lauren and Altman, Aaron and Li, Peng and Mahalingam, Krishnamurthy and Urwin, Brittany T. and Howe, Brandon M. and Page, Michael R. and Grutter, Alexander J. and Kirby, Brian J. and Suzuki, Yuri},
abstractNote = {Low-damping magnetic oxide thin films with small thicknesses are essential for efficient insulator spintronic devices, particularly those driven by spin torque effects. Here, we investigate the depth-resolved compositional and magnetic properties of epitaxial spinel MgAl0.5Fe1.5O4 (MAFO), which has recently been reported as a promising low-damping insulator. We find that ≈11nm films exhibit optimal Gilbert damping, with a typical damping parameter of 0.001. While defects due to strain relaxation in the bulk of the film contribute to increased damping for large film thickness, the damping increase in thinner films is attributed to the presence of a chemically disordered magnetic dead layer at the film/substrate interface. This interfacial dead layer arises from an Fe-deficient MAFO layer. Notably, this layer is only about one-sixth the thickness of that found at the interface between yttrium iron garnet films and gadolinium gallium garnet substrates, making MAFO an ideal thin-film insulator for spin-torque applications.},
doi = {10.1063/1.5111326},
journal = {Applied Physics Letters},
number = 13,
volume = 115,
place = {United States},
year = {Tue Sep 24 00:00:00 EDT 2019},
month = {Tue Sep 24 00:00:00 EDT 2019}
}
Web of Science
Works referenced in this record:
Spin Pumping at the Magnetic Insulator (YIG)/Normal Metal (Au) Interfaces
journal, August 2011
- Heinrich, B.; Burrowes, C.; Montoya, E.
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 107, Issue 6
Comparative measurements of inverse spin Hall effects and magnetoresistance in YIG/Pt and YIG/Ta
journal, May 2013
- Hahn, C.; de Loubens, G.; Klein, O.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 87, Issue 17
Damping in Yttrium Iron Garnet Nanoscale Films Capped by Platinum
journal, September 2013
- Sun, Yiyan; Chang, Houchen; Kabatek, Michael
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 111, Issue 10
Enhanced spin pumping at yttrium iron garnet/Au interfaces
journal, February 2012
- Burrowes, C.; Heinrich, B.; Kardasz, B.
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 100, Issue 9
Growth and ferromagnetic resonance properties of nanometer-thick yttrium iron garnet films
journal, October 2012
- Sun, Yiyan; Song, Young-Yeal; Chang, Houchen
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 101, Issue 15
Spin-wave excitation and propagation in microstructured waveguides of yttrium iron garnet/Pt bilayers
journal, January 2014
- Pirro, P.; Brächer, T.; Chumak, A. V.
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 104, Issue 1
Coexistence of Low Damping and Strong Magnetoelastic Coupling in Epitaxial Spinel Ferrite Thin Films
journal, July 2017
- Emori, Satoru; Gray, Benjamin A.; Jeon, Hyung-Min
- Advanced Materials, Vol. 29, Issue 34
Unexpected structural and magnetic depth dependence of YIG thin films
journal, September 2017
- Cooper, J. F. K.; Kinane, C. J.; Langridge, S.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 96, Issue 10
Spin caloritronic nano-oscillator
journal, July 2017
- Safranski, C.; Barsukov, I.; Lee, H. K.
- Nature Communications, Vol. 8, Issue 1
Ultralow Damping in Nanometer-Thick Epitaxial Spinel Ferrite Thin Films
journal, May 2018
- Emori, Satoru; Yi, Di; Crossley, Sam
- Nano Letters, Vol. 18, Issue 7
Generation of coherent spin-wave modes in yttrium iron garnet microdiscs by spin–orbit torque
journal, January 2016
- Collet, M.; de Milly, X.; d’Allivy Kelly, O.
- Nature Communications, Vol. 7, Issue 1
Preparation of MgIn 2 O 4 Epitaxial Oxide Electrode with Spinel Structure and Heteroepitaxial Growth of BaTiO 3 –NiFe 2 O 4 Multiferroic Composite Thin Film
journal, September 2009
- Wakiya, Naoki; Sawamura, Shigeki; Tanemura, Kazuki
- Japanese Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 48, Issue 9
Magnetotransport in La0.7Sr0.3MnO3/CuCr2O4/Fe3O4 magnetic junctions
journal, January 2015
- Iwata-Harms, Jodi M.; Chopdekar, Rajesh V.; Wong, Franklin J.
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 106, Issue 1
Inverse spin Hall effect in nanometer-thick yttrium iron garnet/Pt system
journal, August 2013
- d'Allivy Kelly, O.; Anane, A.; Bernard, R.
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 103, Issue 8
Interfacial Origin of the Magnetisation Suppression of Thin Film Yttrium Iron Garnet
journal, September 2017
- Mitra, A.; Cespedes, O.; Ramasse, Q.
- Scientific Reports, Vol. 7, Issue 1
Thickness and power dependence of the spin-pumping effect in /Pt heterostructures measured by the inverse spin Hall effect
journal, April 2015
- Jungfleisch, M. B.; Chumak, A. V.; Kehlberger, A.
- Physical Review B, Vol. 91, Issue 13
Atomic structure of the interface between SrTiO3 thin films and Si(001) substrates
journal, September 2008
- Mi, Shao-Bo; Jia, Chun-Lin; Vaithyanathan, Venu
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 93, Issue 10
Current-induced switching in a magnetic insulator
journal, November 2016
- Avci, Can Onur; Quindeau, Andy; Pai, Chi-Feng
- Nature Materials, Vol. 16, Issue 3
Use of misfit strain to remove dislocations from epitaxial thin films
journal, April 1976
- Matthews, J. W.; Blakeslee, A. E.; Mader, S.
- Thin Solid Films, Vol. 33, Issue 2
Spin-Current Generation in Low-Damping Spinel Ferrite
journal, June 2018
- Gray, M. T.; Emori, S.; Gray, B. A.
- Physical Review Applied, Vol. 9, Issue 6
Spin-polarized conduction in oxide magnetic tunnel junctions with magnetic and nonmagnetic insulating barrier layers
journal, October 2006
- Alldredge, L. M. B.; Chopdekar, R. V.; Nelson-Cheeseman, B. B.
- Applied Physics Letters, Vol. 89, Issue 18
Ferromagnetic resonance of sputtered yttrium iron garnet nanometer films
journal, May 2014
- Liu, Tao; Chang, Houchen; Vlaminck, Vincent
- Journal of Applied Physics, Vol. 115, Issue 17
Magnon spintronics
journal, June 2015
- Chumak, A. V.; Vasyuchka, V. I.; Serga, A. A.
- Nature Physics, Vol. 11, Issue 6
Controlled enhancement of spin-current emission by three-magnon splitting
journal, July 2011
- Kurebayashi, Hidekazu; Dzyapko, Oleksandr; Demidov, Vladislav E.
- Nature Materials, Vol. 10, Issue 9
Large Spin-Wave Bullet in a Ferrimagnetic Insulator Driven by the Spin Hall Effect
journal, February 2016
- Jungfleisch, M. B.; Zhang, W.; Sklenar, J.
- Physical Review Letters, Vol. 116, Issue 5
Pulsed laser deposition of epitaxial yttrium iron garnet films with low Gilbert damping and bulk-like magnetization
journal, October 2014
- Onbasli, M. C.; Kehlberger, A.; Kim, D. H.
- APL Materials, Vol. 2, Issue 10
Comparative Measurements of Inverse Spin Hall and Magnetoresistance in YIG|Pt and YIG|Ta
text, January 2013
- Hahn, Christian; De Loubens, Grégoire; Klein, Olivier
- arXiv
Generation of coherent spin-wave modes in Yttrium Iron Garnet microdiscs by spin-orbit torque
text, January 2015
- Collet, Martin; De Milly, Xavier; D'Allivy-Kelly, Olivier
- arXiv