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Download fileCoexistence of Magnetic Orders in Two-Dimensional Magnet CrI3
journal contribution
posted on 2019-12-02, 22:44 authored by Ben Niu, Tang Su, Brian A. Francisco, Subhajit Ghosh, Fariborz Kargar, Xiong Huang, Mark Lohmann, Junxue Li, Yadong Xu, Takashi Taniguchi, Kenji Watanabe, Di Wu, Alexander Balandin, Jing Shi, Yong-Tao CuiThe magnetic properties in two-dimensional van der Waals
materials
depend sensitively on structure. CrI3, as an example, has
been recently demonstrated to exhibit distinct magnetic properties
depending on the layer thickness and stacking order. Bulk CrI3 is ferromagnetic (FM) with a Curie temperature of 61 K and
a rhombohedral layer stacking, whereas few-layer CrI3 has
a layered antiferromagnetic (AFM) phase with a lower ordering temperature
of 45 K and a monoclinic stacking. In this work, we use cryogenic
magnetic force microscopy to investigate CrI3 flakes in
the intermediate thickness range (25–200 nm) and find that
the two types of magnetic orders, hence the stacking orders, can coexist
in the same flake with a layer of ∼13 nm at each surface being
in the layered AFM phase similar to few-layer CrI3 and
the rest in the bulk FM phase. The switching of the bulk moment proceeds
through a remnant state with nearly compensated magnetic moment along
the c-axis, indicating formation of c-axis domains allowed by a weak interlayer coupling strength in the
rhombohedral phase. Our results provide a comprehensive picture on
the magnetism in CrI3 and point to the possibility of engineering
magnetic heterostructures within the same material.