Emerging two-dimensional ferromagnetism in silicene materials

• DOI: 10.1038/s41467-018-04012-2
• Publication Date: 2018-04-20T12:16:03Z
• Authors: Andrey M. Tokmachev; Dmitry V. Averyanov; Oleg E. Parfenov; Alexander N. Tald...; Igor A. Karateev; Ivan S. Sokolov; Oleg A. Kondratev; Vyacheslav G. Sto...
• Keywords: Magnetism

The appeal of ultra-compact spintronics drives intense research on magnetism in low-dimensional materials. Recent years have witnessed remarkable progress engineering two-dimensional (2D) via defects, edges, adatoms, and magnetic proximity. However, intrinsic 2D ferromagnetism remained elusive until recent discovery out-of-plane magneto-optical response Cr-based layers, stimulating the search for magnets with tunable diverse properties. Here we employ a bottom-up approach to produce layered structures silicene (a Si counterpart graphene) functionalized by rare-earth atoms, ranging from bulk down one monolayer. We track evolution antiferromagnetism in-plane ultrathin its characteristic dependence transition temperature low fields. emerging manifests itself electron transport. class robust magnets, compatible mature technology, is instrumental new devices understanding spin phenomena.