Giant Tunneling Magnetoresistance in Spin-Filter van der Waals Heterostructures

ORAL

Abstract

Magnetic multilayer devices that exploit magnetoresistance are the backbone of magnetic sensing and modern data storage technologies. However, van der Waals heterostructures with magnetic information storage and processing functionalities are still largely unexplored due to the lack of atomically thin 2D magnets. Recent breakthroughs in 2D magnetic materials offer a timely opportunity to explore these key functionalities in the atomically thin limit. Here we report novel multiple-spin-filter magnetic tunnel junctions (sf-MTJs) based on van der Waals (vdW) heterostructures in which atomically thin chromium triiodide (CrI3) acts as a spin-filter tunnel barrier. We demonstrate drastically enhanced tunneling magnetoresistance with increasing CrI3 layer thickness. Based on magnetic circular dichroism measurements, we attribute these effects to the intrinsic layer-by-layer antiferromagnetic ordering of atomically thin CrI3. The realization of such vdW heterostructure sf-MTJs could thus stimulate the study of novel 2D magnetic interface phenomena and spintronics, such as spin current sources and magnetoresistive random-access memory (MRAM).

*This work is mainly supported by the Department of Energy (DE-SC0018171) and the National Science Foundation (NSF-DMR-1708419).

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Presenters

  • Tiancheng Song

    • Univ of Washington
    • University of Washington

Authors

  • Tiancheng Song

    • Univ of Washington
    • University of Washington

  • Xinghan Cai

    • University of Washington

  • Wei-Yuan Tu

    • University of Hong Kong

  • Xiaoou Zhang

    • Carnegie Mellon University
    • Carnegie Mellon Univ

  • Bevin Huang

    • Univ of Washington
    • Physics, Univ of Washington
    • University of Washington

  • Nathan Wilson

    • University of Washington
    • Department of Physics, University of Washington

  • Kyle Seyler

    • University of Washington

  • Michael McGuire

    • Oak Ridge National Laboratory
    • Materials Science and Technology Division, Oak Ridge National Laboratory
    • Oak Ridge National Lab

  • David Cobden

    • Univ of Washington
    • Department of Physics, University of Washington
    • University of Washington
    • Physics, University of Washington

  • Di Xiao

    • Carnegie Mellon University
    • Physics department, Carnegie Mellon University
    • Department of Physics, Carnegie Mellon University
    • Carnegie Mellon Univ

  • Wang Yao

    • Department of Physics, University of Hong Kong
    • Hong Kong University
    • University of Hong Kong
    • The University of Hong Kong
    • Department of Physics and Center of Theoretical and Computational Physics, University of Hong Kong

  • Xiaodong Xu

    • University of Washington
    • Univ of Washington
    • Physics, Univ of Washington
    • Department of Physics, University of Washington
    • Physics, University of Washington
    • Physics, and Materials Science and Engineering, Univ of Washington
    • Department of Physics, University of Washington - Seattle