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Strong interfacial exchange field in the graphene/EuS heterostructure

Nature Materials volume 15, pages 711–716 (2016)Cite this article

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Abstract

Exploiting 2D materials for spintronic applications can potentially realize next-generation devices featuring low power consumption and quantum operation capability1,2,3. The magnetic exchange field (MEF) induced by an adjacent magnetic insulator enables efficient control of local spin generation and spin modulation in 2D devices without compromising the delicate material structures4,5. Using graphene as a prototypical 2D system, we demonstrate that its coupling to the model magnetic insulator (EuS) produces a substantial MEF (>14 T) with the potential to reach hundreds of tesla, which leads to orders-of-magnitude enhancement of the spin signal originating from the Zeeman spin Hall effect. Furthermore, the new ferromagnetic ground state of Dirac electrons resulting from the strong MEF may give rise to quantized spin-polarized edge transport. The MEF effect shown in our graphene/EuS devices therefore provides a key functionality for future spin logic and memory devices based on emerging 2D materials in classical and quantum information processing.

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Figure 1: Synthesis and characterization of graphene/EuS heterostructures.
Figure 2: Zeeman spin Hall effect in graphene/EuS heterostructures.
Figure 3: Estimate of the graphene/EuS interfacial exchange field using Zeeman spin Hall signals.
Figure 4: Effect of strong interfacial exchange field in the quantum Hall regime.

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Acknowledgements

We thank J. Bucchignano, S. Dawes, B. Ek, J. Gonsalves and E. Galligan at IBM for the technical support. We also thank D. A. Abanin, E. Berg, L. S. Levitov, P. A. Lee, M. E. Flatté and D. Xiao for valuable discussions. P.W. and J.S.M. would like to acknowledge support from National Science Foundation Grant DMR-1207469, Office of Naval Research Grant N00014-13-1-0301, and John Templeton Foundation Grant No. 39944. J.H. and S.L. would like to acknowledge support from the NSF MRSEC programme through Columbia in the Center for Precision Assembly of Superstratic and Superatomic Solids (DMR-1420634). D.H. would like to acknowledge support from National Science Foundation Grant ECCS-1402378.

Author information

Author notes

  1. Florian Lemaitre & Lucas Pinel

    Present address: Present addresses: Department of Electrical Engineering, Eindhoven University of Technology, 5612 AZ, Eindhoven, The Netherlands (F.L.); Department of Electronic & Electrical Engineering, The University of Sheffield, Mappin Street, Sheffield S1 3JD, UK (L.P.).,

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Francis Bitter Magnet Laboratory, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA

    Peng Wei, Ferhat Katmis & Jagadeesh S. Moodera

  2. Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA

    Peng Wei, Ferhat Katmis & Jagadeesh S. Moodera

  3. IBM TJ Watson Research Center, Yorktown Heights, New York 10598, USA

    Sunwoo Lee, Florian Lemaitre, Lucas Pinel, Davide Cutaia, Yu Zhu & Ching-Tzu Chen

  4. Electrical Engineering Department, Columbia University, New York, New York 10027, USA

    Sunwoo Lee

  5. Institut polytechnique de Grenoble, F38031 Grenoble Cedex 1, France

    Florian Lemaitre & Lucas Pinel

  6. IBM Zurich Research Laboratory, Säumerstrasse 4, CH- 8803 Rüschlikon, Switzerland

    Davide Cutaia

  7. Mechanical Engineering Department, Columbia University, New York, New York 10027, USA

    Wujoon Cha & James Hone

  8. Department of Physics, Northeastern University, Boston, Massachusetts 02115, USA

    Donald Heiman

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Contributions

C.-T.C. conceived of the project. S.L., W.C. and J.H. fabricated the CVD graphene devices. P.W. and J.S.M. synthesized the graphene/EuS heterostructures. P.W., F.K., Y.Z., D.H., J.S.M. and C.-T.C. characterized the EuS properties. F.L., S.L., L.P., W.C., D.C. and C.-T.C. carried out the transport experiments. P.W. and C.-T.C. analysed the data and drafted the manuscript. All authors commented on the manuscript.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to Peng Wei or Ching-Tzu Chen.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Wei, P., Lee, S., Lemaitre, F. et al. Strong interfacial exchange field in the graphene/EuS heterostructure. Nature Mater 15, 711–716 (2016). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat4603

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