Evidence of a C60 /Co interface reconstruction and its influence on magnetic properties

Cynthia Fourmental (1) , Ludovic Le Laurent (2) , Vincent Repain (1) , Cyril Chacon (1) , Yann Girard (1) , Jérôme Lagoute (1) , Sylvie Rousset (1) , Alessandro Coati (3) , Yves Garreau (1, 3) , Andrea Resta (3) , Alina Vlad (3) , Cyrille Barreteau (2) , Alexander Smogunov (2) , Dongzhe Li (4) , Amandine Bellec (1)

1 MPQ (UMR_7162) - Laboratoire Matériaux et Phénomènes Quantiques
2 SPEC - UMR3680 - Service de physique de l'état condensé
3 SSOLEIL - Synchrotron SOLEIL
4 CEMES - Centre d'élaboration de matériaux et d'études structurales

By using grazing incidence x-ray diffraction and scanning tunneling microscopy experiments, we determine the interface structure of a C 60 layer deposited on a Co(0001) surface. The room temperature deposition gives rise to a (4 × 4) molecular structure with a 10% vertical relaxation of the underneath Co atoms. When annealed around 550 K, the interface undergoes a structural change with most of the buckyballs sitting in a seven Co vacancies nanohole. Ab initio calculations show that this interface reconstruction is stabilized by a strong C-Co hybridization and has a significant impact both on the interfacial magnetic anisotropy that is decreased and on the molecular spin polarization that it increased.

Domaines: Science des matériaux [cond-mat.mtrl-sci]

Cynthia Fourmental, Ludovic Le Laurent, Vincent Repain, Cyril Chacon, Yann Girard, et al.. Evidence of a C60 /Co interface reconstruction and its influence on magnetic properties. Physical Review B, 2021, 104 (23), pp.235413. ⟨10.1103/PhysRevB.104.235413⟩. ⟨hal-03540843⟩