No Arabic abstract
Strong electronic correlations can produce remarkable phenomena such as metal-insulator transitions and greatly enhance superconductivity, thermoelectricity, or optical non-linearity. In correlated systems, spatially varying charge textures also amplify magnetoelectric effects or electroresistance in mesostructures. However, how spatially varying spin textures may influence electron transport in the presence of correlations remains unclear. Here we demonstrate a very large topological Hall effect (THE) in thin films of a lightly electron-doped charge-transfer insulator, (Ca, Ce)MnO3. Magnetic force microscopy reveals the presence of magnetic bubbles, whose density vs. magnetic field peaks near the THE maximum, as is expected to occur in skyrmion systems. The THE critically depends on carrier concentration and diverges at low doping, near the metal-insulator transition. We discuss the strong amplification of the THE by correlation effects and give perspectives for its non-volatile control by electric fields.
A central theme in condensed matter physics is to create and understand the exotic states of matter by incorporating magnetism into topological materials. One prime example is the quantum anomalous Hall (QAH) state. Recently, MnBi2Te4 has been demonstrated to be an intrinsic magnetic topological insulator and the QAH effect was observed in exfoliated MnBi2Te4 flakes. Here, we used molecular beam epitaxy (MBE) to grow MnBi2Te4 films with thickness down to 1 septuple layer (SL) and performed thickness-dependent transport measurements. We observed a non-square hysteresis loop in the antiferromagnetic state for films with thickness greater than 2 SL. The hysteresis loop can be separated into two AH components. Through careful analysis, we demonstrated that one AH component with the larger coercive field is from the dominant MnBi2Te4 phase, while the other AH component with the smaller coercive field is from the minor Mn-doped Bi2Te3 phase in the samples. The extracted AH component of the MnBi2Te4 phase shows a clear even-odd layer-dependent behavior, a signature of antiferromagnetic thin films. Our studies reveal insights on how to optimize the MBE growth conditions to improve the quality of MnBi2Te4 films, in which the QAH and other exotic states are predicted.
We show that the spin-orbit coupling (SOC) in alpha-MnTe impacts the transport behavior by generating an anisotropic valence-band splitting, resulting in four spin-polarized pockets near Gamma. A minimal k-dot-p model is constructed to capture this splitting by group theory analysis, a tight-binding model and ab initio calculations. The model is shown to describe the rotation symmetry of the zero-field planer Hall effect (PHE). The upper limit of the PHE percentage is shown to be fundamentally determined by the band shape, and is quantitatively estimated to be roughly 31% by first principles.
We report on Cr doping effect in Mn3Sn polycrystalline films with both uniform and modulation doping. It is found that Cr doping with low concentration does not cause notable changes to the structural and magnetic properties of Mn3Sn, but it significantly enhances the anomalous Hall conductivity, particularly for modulation-doped samples at low temperature. A Hall conductivity as high as 184.8 {Omega}-1 cm-1 is obtained for modulation-doped samples at 50 K, in a sharp contrast to vanishingly small values for undoped samples at the same temperature. We attribute the enhancement to the change of Fermi level induced by Cr doping
A topological insulator (TI) interfaced with a magnetic insulator (MI) may host an anomalous Hall effect (AHE), a quantum AHE, and a topological Hall effect (THE). Recent studies, however, suggest that coexisting magnetic phases in TI/MI heterostructures may result in an AHE-associated response that resembles a THE but in fact is not. This article reports a genuine THE in a TI/MI structure that has only one magnetic phase. The structure shows a THE in the temperature range of T=2-3 K and an AHE at T=80-300 K. Over T=3-80 K, the two effects coexist but show opposite temperature dependencies. Control measurements, calculations, and simulations together suggest that the observed THE originates from skyrmions, rather than the coexistence of two AHE responses. The skyrmions are formed due to an interfacial DMI interaction. The DMI strength estimated is substantially higher than that in heavy metal-based systems.
Breaking the time-reversal symmetry of a topological insulator (TI) by ferromagnetism can induce exotic magnetoelectric phenomena such as quantized anomalous Hall (QAH) effect. Experimental observation of QAH effect in a magnetically doped TI requires ferromagnetism not relying on the charge carriers. We have realized the ferromagnetism independent of both polarity and density of carriers in Cr-doped BixSb2-xTe3 thin films grown by molecular beam epitaxy. Meanwhile, the anomalous Hall effect is found significantly enhanced with decreasing carrier density, with the anomalous Hall angle reaching unusually large value 0.2 and the zero field Hall resistance reaching one quarter of the quantum resistance (h/e2), indicating the approaching of the QAH regime. The work paves the way to ultimately realize QAH effect and other unique magnetoelectric phenomena in TIs.