From ballistic transport to tunneling in electromigrated ferromagnetic breakjunctions

Electrically Controlled Bimetallic Junctions for Atomic-Scale Electronics

Forming atomic-scale contacts with attractive geometries and material compositions is a long-term goal of nanotechnology. Here, we show that a rich family of bimetallic atomic-contacts can be fabricated in break-junction setups. The structure and material composition of these contacts can be controlled by atomically precise electromigration, where the metal types of the electron-injecting and sink electrodes determine the type of atoms added to, or subtracted from, the contact structure. The formed bimetallic structures include, for example, platinum and aluminum electrodes bridged by an atomic chain composed of platinum and aluminum atoms as well as iron-nickel single-atom contacts that act as a spin-valve break junction without the need for sophisticated spin-valve geometries. The versatile nature of atomic contacts in bimetallic junctions and the ability to control their structure by electromigration can be used to expand the structural variety of atomic and molecular junctions and their span of properties.

5 nm Nanogap Electrodes and Arrays by Super-resolution Laser Lithography

The development of reliable, mass-produced, and cost-effective sub-10 nm nanofabrication technology leads to an unprecedented level of integration of photonic devices. In this work, we describe the development of a laser direct writing (LDW) lithography technique with ∼5 nm feature size, which is about 1/55 of the optical diffraction limit of the LDW system (405 nm laser and 0.9 NA objective), and the realization of 5 nm nanogap electrodes. This LDW lithography exhibits an attractive capability of well-site control and mass production of ∼5 × 10⁵ nanogap electrodes per hour, breaking the trade-off between resolution and throughput in a nanofabrication technique. Nanosensing chips have been demonstrated with the as-obtained nanogap electrodes, where controllable surface enhancement Raman scattering of rhodamine 6G has been realized via adjusting the gap width and, especially, the applied bias voltages. Our results establish that such a low-cost and high-efficient lithography technology has great potential to fabricate compact integrated circuits and biochips.

Remote control of magnetostriction-based nanocontacts at room temperature

The remote control of the electrical conductance through nanosized junctions at room temperature will play an important role in future nano-electromechanical systems and electronic devices. This can be achieved by exploiting the magnetostriction effects of ferromagnetic materials. Here we report on the electrical conductance of magnetic nanocontacts obtained from wires of the giant magnetostrictive compound Tb_0.3Dy_0.7Fe_1.95 as an active element in a mechanically controlled break-junction device. The nanocontacts are reproducibly switched at room temperature between “open” (zero conductance) and “closed” (nonzero conductance) states by variation of a magnetic field applied perpendicularly to the long wire axis. Conductance measurements in a magnetic field oriented parallel to the long wire axis exhibit a different behaviour where the conductance switches between both states only in a limited field range close to the coercive field. Investigating the conductance in the regime of electron tunneling by mechanical or magnetostrictive control of the electrode separation enables an estimation of the magnetostriction. The present results pave the way to utilize the material in devices based on nano-electromechanical systems operating at room temperature.

Indication of Complete Spin Filtering in Atomic-Scale Nickel Oxide

Generating highly spin-polarized currents at the nanoscale is essential for spin current manipulations and spintronic applications. We find indications for up to 100% spin-polarized currents across nickel oxide atomic junctions formed between two nickel electrodes. The degree of spin polarization is probed by analyzing the shot noise resulting from the discrete statistics of spin-polarized electron transport. We show that spin filtering can be significantly enhanced by local chemical modifications at the single-atom level. This approach paves the way for effective manipulations of spin transport at the fundamental limit of miniaturization.

Unexpected magnetic properties of gas-stabilized platinum nanostructures in the tunneling regime

Nanostructured materials often have properties widely different from bulk, imposed by quantum limits to a physical property of the material. This includes, for example, superparamagnetism and quantized conductance, but original properties such as magnetoresistance in nonmagnetic molecular structures may also emerge. In this Letter, we report on the atomic manipulation of platinum nanocontacts in order to induce magnetoresistance. Platinum is a paramagnetic 5d metal, but atomic chains of this material have been predicted to be magnetically ordered with a large anisotropy. Remarkably, we find that a gas flow stabilizes Pt atomic structures in a break junction experiment, where we observe extraordinary resistance changes over 30,000% in a temperature range up to 77 K. Simulations indicate that this behavior may stem from a previously unknown magnetically ordered, low-energy state in platinum oxide atomic chains. This is supported by measurements in Pt/PtOx superlattices revealing the presence of a ferromagnetic moment. These properties open new paths of research for atomic scale "dirty" magnetic sensors and quantum devices.

Gate-tunable large negative tunnel magnetoresistance in Ni-C60-Ni single molecule transistors

We have fabricated single C(60) molecule transistors with ferromagnetic Ni leads (FM-SMTs) by using an electrical break junction method and investigated their magnetotransport. The FM-SMTs exhibited clear gate-dependent hysteretic tunnel magnetoresistance (TMR) and the TMR values reached as high as -80%. The polarity of the TMR was found to be always negative over the entire bias range studied here. Density functional theory calculations show that hybridization between the Ni substrate states and the C(60) molecular orbitals generates an antiferromagnetic configuration in the local density of states near the Fermi level, which gives a reasonable explanation for the observed negative TMR.

Domain-wall induced large magnetoresistance effects at zero applied field in ballistic nanocontacts

We determine magnetoresistance effects in stable and clean Permalloy nanocontacts of variable cross section, fabricated by UHV deposition and in situ electromigration. To ascertain the magnetoresistance (MR) effects originating from a magnetic domain wall, we measure the resistance values with and without such a wall at zero applied field. In the ballistic transport regime, the MR ratio reaches up to 50% and exhibits a previously unobserved sign change. Our results can be reproduced by recent atomistic calculations for different atomic configurations of the nanocontact, highlighting the importance of the detailed atomic arrangement for the MR effect.

Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction in transport through single-molecule transistors

The Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction is shown to result in a canting of spins in a single-molecule transistor. We predict nonlinear transport signatures of this effect induced by spin-orbit coupling for the generic case of a molecular dimer. The conductance is calculated using a master equation and is found to exhibit a non-trivial dependence on the magnitude and direction of an external magnetic field. We show how three-terminal transport measurements allow for a determination of the coupling vector characterizing the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction. In particular, we show how its orientation, defining the intramolecular spin chirality, can be probed with ferromagnetic electrodes.

Nanogap electrodes

Nanogap electrodes (namely, a pair of electrodes with a nanometer gap) are fundamental building blocks for the fabrication of nanometer-sized devices and circuits. They are also important tools for the examination of material properties at the nanometer scale, even at the molecular scale. In this review, the techniques for the fabrication of nanogap electrodes, the preparation of assembled devices based on the nanogap electrodes, and the potential application of these nanodevices for analysis of material properties are introduced. The history, the research status, and the prospects of nanogap electrodes are also discussed.

Kondo effect and conductance of nanocontacts with magnetic impurities

We study the impact of dynamical correlations on the electronic structure and coherent transport properties of Cu nanocontacts hosting a single magnetic impurity (Ni, Co, Fe) in the contact region. The strong dynamical correlations of the impurity 3d electrons are fully taken into account by combining density-functional calculations with a dynamical treatment of the impurity 3d shell in the one-crossing approximation. We find that dynamical correlations give rise to the Kondo effect and lead to Fano features in the coherent transport characteristics similar to those observed in related experiments.

Exploring the conduction in atomic-sized metallic constrictions created by controlled ion etching

A novel technique to establish atomic-sized contacts in metallic materials is shown. It is based on etching a (sub)micrometric electrode via a low-energy focused ion beam. The in situ measurements of the nanoconstriction resistance during the etching process permit control of the formation of atomic-sized constrictions with milling time, observing steps in the conductance in the range of the conductance quantum (G(0) = 2e(2)/h), just before entering the tunnelling regime. These constrictions are highly stable with time due to the adherence to a substrate, which allows further studies such as the detailed current-voltage transport investigation reported here. Scanning electron microscopy images are used to correlate the etching process and the constriction microstructure. The high control achieved in the process makes us suggest this technique as a promising route to study physical phenomena in the verge of the metal-tunnel conduction crossover.

Integrated setup for the fabrication and measurement of magnetoresistive nanoconstrictions in ultrahigh vacuum

A UHV instrument is presented for in situ fabrication of nanostructures and in situ investigation of their magnetoresistance. Nanostructures of diverse shape and size are created from thin films utilizing a focused ion beam. The magnetic nanostructures are contacted via a micromanipulator, which makes it possible to address the individual structures. The system is additionally equipped with a scanning electron microscope column, which is used for damage-free navigation and control of the structuring and contacting. First magnetoresistance measurements of structures carved into a Permalloy film demonstrate the high sensitivity and the flexibility of the new setup.

Magnon coherent conductance via atomic nanocontacts

A calculation for the coherent scattering and conductance of magnons via atomic nanocontacts is presented. The model system is composed of two groups of semi-infinite magnetically ordered Heisenberg monatomic chains, joined together by the magnetic nanocontact, and the system is supported on a non-magnetic substrate and considered otherwise free from magnetic interactions. The coherent transmission and reflection coefficients are derived as elements of a Landauer-type scattering matrix. Transmission and reflection scattering cross sections are calculated specifically for three distinct symmetric and asymmetric geometric configurations of the nanocontact. Three cases of local magnetic exchange on the nanocontact domain are analysed for each configuration to investigate the influence of softening and hardening of the magnetic boundary conditions. In analogy with coherent electronic transport, we calculate the magnon coherent transport. The numerical results show the interference effects between the incident scattered magnons and the localized spin states on the nanocontact, with characteristic Fano resonances. The numerical results yield an understanding of the relationship between the coherent magnon conductance and the architecture of the embedded magnetic nanocontact.

Anisotropic magnetoresistance and anisotropic tunneling magnetoresistance due to quantum interference in ferromagnetic metal break junctions

We measure the low-temperature resistance of permalloy break junctions as a function of contact size and the magnetic field angle in applied fields large enough to saturate the magnetization. For both nanometer-scale metallic contacts and tunneling devices we observe large changes in resistance with the angle, as large as 25% in the tunneling regime. The pattern of magnetoresistance is sensitive to changes in bias on a scale of a few mV. We interpret the effect as a consequence of conductance fluctuations due to quantum interference.