Magnetic van der Waals (vdW) materials have emerged as promising candidates for spintronics applications, especially after the recent discovery of intrinsic ferromagnetism in monolayer vdW materials. ...There has been a critical need for tunable ferromagnetic vdW materials beyond room temperature. Here, we report a real-space imaging study of itinerant ferromagnet Fe3GeTe2 and the enhancement of its Curie temperature well above ambient temperature. We find that the magnetic long-range order in Fe3GeTe2 is characterized by an unconventional out-of-plane stripe-domain phase. In Fe3GeTe2 microstructures patterned by a focused ion beam, the out-of-plane stripe domain phase undergoes a surprising transition at 230 K to an in-plane vortex phase that persists beyond room temperature. The discovery of tunable ferromagnetism in Fe3GeTe2 materials opens up vast opportunities for utilizing vdW magnets in room-temperature spintronics devices.
Nucleation plays a critical role in many physical and biological phenomena that range from crystallization, melting and evaporation to the formation of clouds and the initiation of neurodegenerative ...diseases
. However, nucleation is a challenging process to study experimentally, especially in its early stages, when several atoms or molecules start to form a new phase from a parent phase. A number of experimental and computational methods have been used to investigate nucleation processes
, but experimental determination of the three-dimensional atomic structure and the dynamics of early-stage nuclei has been unachievable. Here we use atomic electron tomography to study early-stage nucleation in four dimensions (that is, including time) at atomic resolution. Using FePt nanoparticles as a model system, we find that early-stage nuclei are irregularly shaped, each has a core of one to a few atoms with the maximum order parameter, and the order parameter gradient points from the core to the boundary of the nucleus. We capture the structure and dynamics of the same nuclei undergoing growth, fluctuation, dissolution, merging and/or division, which are regulated by the order parameter distribution and its gradient. These experimental observations are corroborated by molecular dynamics simulations of heterogeneous and homogeneous nucleation in liquid-solid phase transitions of Pt. Our experimental and molecular dynamics results indicate that a theory beyond classical nucleation theory
is needed to describe early-stage nucleation at the atomic scale. We anticipate that the reported approach will open the door to the study of many fundamental problems in materials science, nanoscience, condensed matter physics and chemistry, such as phase transition, atomic diffusion, grain boundary dynamics, interface motion, defect dynamics and surface reconstruction with four-dimensional atomic resolution.
Contacting ferromagnetic films with normal metals changes how magnetic textures respond to electric currents, enabling surprisingly fast domain wall motions and spin texture-dependent propagation ...direction. These effects are attributed to domain wall chirality induced by the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction at interfaces, which suggests rich possibilities to influence domain wall dynamics if the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction can be adjusted. Chiral magnetism was seen in several film structures on appropriately chosen substrates where interfacial spin-orbit-coupling effects are strong. Here we use real-space imaging to visualize chiral domain walls in cobalt/nickel multilayers in contact with platinum and iridium. We show that the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction can be adjusted to stabilize either left-handed or right-handed Néel walls, or non-chiral Bloch walls by adjusting an interfacial spacer layer between the multilayers and the substrate. Our findings introduce domain wall chirality as a new degree of freedom, which may open up new opportunities for spintronics device designs.
The Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI) has drawn much attention, as it stabilizes magnetic chirality, with important implications in fundamental and applied research. This antisymmetric exchange ...interaction is induced by the broken inversion symmetry at interfaces or in noncentrosymmetric lattices. Significant interfacial DMIs are often found at magnetic/heavy-metal interfaces with large spin-orbit coupling. Recent studies have shown promise for induced DMI at interfaces involving light elements such as carbon (graphene) or oxygen. Here, we report direct observation of induced DMI by chemisorption of the lightest element, hydrogen, on a ferromagnetic layer at room temperature, which is supported by density functional theory calculations. We further demonstrate a reversible chirality transition of the magnetic domain walls due to the induced DMI via hydrogen chemisorption and desorption. These results shed new light on the understanding of DMI in low atomic number materials and the design of novel chiral spintronics and magneto-ionic devices.
The possibility of utilizing the rich spin-dependent properties of graphene has attracted much attention in the pursuit of spintronics advances. The promise of high-speed and low-energy-consumption ...devices motivates the search for layered structures that stabilize chiral spin textures such as topologically protected skyrmions. Here we demonstrate that chiral spin textures are induced at graphene/ferromagnetic metal interfaces. Graphene is a weak spin-orbit coupling material and is generally not expected to induce a sufficient Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction to affect magnetic chirality. We demonstrate that indeed graphene does induce a type of Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction due to the Rashba effect. First-principles calculations and experiments using spin-polarized electron microscopy show that this graphene-induced Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction can have a similar magnitude to that at interfaces with heavy metals. This work paves a path towards two-dimensional-material-based spin-orbitronics.
The situation of the COVID-19 pandemic reminds us that we permanently need high-value flexible solutions to urgent clinical needs including simplified diagnostic technologies suitable for use in the ...field and for delivering targeted therapeutics. From our perspective nanotechnology is revealed as a vital resource for this, as a generic platform of technical solutions to tackle complex medical challenges. It is towards this perspective and focusing on nanomedicine that we take issue with Prof Park's recent editorial published in the Journal of Controlled Release. Prof. Park argued that in the last 15 years nanomedicine failed to deliver the promised innovative clinical solutions to the patients (Park, K. The beginning of the end of the nanomedicine hype. Journal of Controlled Release, 2019; 305, 221–222 1. We, the ETPN (European Technology Platform on Nanomedicine) 2, respectfully disagree. In fact, the more than 50 formulations currently in the market, and the recent approval of 3 key nanomedicine products (e. g. Onpattro, Hensify and Vyxeos), have demonstrated that the nanomedicine field is concretely able to design products that overcome critical barriers in conventional medicine in a unique manner, but also to deliver within the cells new drug-free therapeutic effects by using pure physical modes of action, and therefore make a difference in patients lives. Furthermore, the >400 nanomedicine formulations currently in clinical trials are expecting to bring novel clinical solutions (e.g. platforms for nucleic acid delivery), alone or in combination with other key enabling technologies to the market, including biotechnologies, microfluidics, advanced materials, biomaterials, smart systems, photonics, robotics, textiles, Big Data and ICT (information & communication technologies) more generally. However, we agree with Prof. Park that “ it is time to examine the sources of difficulty in clinical translation of nanomedicine and move forward “. But for reaching this goal, the investments to support clinical translation of promising nanomedicine formulations should increase, not decrease. As recently encouraged by EMA in its roadmap to 2025, we should create more unity through a common knowledge hub linking academia, industry, healthcare providers and hopefully policy makers to reduce the current fragmentation of the standardization and regulatory body landscape. We should also promote a strategy of cross-technology innovation, support nanomedicine development as a high value and low-cost solution to answer unmet medical needs and help the most promising innovative projects of the field to get better and faster to the clinic. This global vision is the one that the ETPN chose to encourage for the last fifteen years. All actions should be taken with a clear clinical view in mind, “ without any fanfare”, to focus “on what matters in real life”, which is the patient and his/her quality of life.
This ETPN overview of achievements in nanomedicine serves to reinforce our drive towards further expanding and growing the maturity of nanomedicine for global healthcare, accelerating the pace of transformation of its great potential into tangible medical breakthroughs.
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•Nanomedicine unquestionably makes a difference for patients.•Innovative nanomedicines open perspectives to make a difference outside oncology.•High need for a harmonized international regulatory framework for nanomedicines.•Nanomedicine is a cross-sectorial and cross-technological solution for healthcare.
We report strongly enhanced perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) of Co films by graphene coating from both first-principles and experiments. Our calculations show that graphene can dramatically ...boost the surface anisotropy of Co films up to twice the value of its pristine counterpart and can extend the out-of-plane effective anisotropy up to unprecedented thickness of 25 Å. These findings are supported by our experiments on graphene coating on Co films grown on Ir substrate. Furthermore, we report layer-resolved and orbital-hybridization-resolved anisotropy analysis, which help understanding of the physical mechanisms of PMA and more practically can help design structures with giant PMA. As an example, we propose superexchange stabilized Co–graphene heterostructures with a robust constant effective PMA and linearly increasing interfacial anisotropy as a function of film thickness. These findings point toward possibilities to engineer graphene/ferromagnetic metal heterostructures with giant magnetic anisotropy more than 20-times larger compared to conventional multilayers, which constitutes a hallmark for future graphene and traditional spintronic technologies.
Amorphous solids such as glass, plastics and amorphous thin films are ubiquitous in our daily life and have broad applications ranging from telecommunications to electronics and solar cells
. ...However, owing to the lack of long-range order, the three-dimensional (3D) atomic structure of amorphous solids has so far eluded direct experimental determination
. Here we develop an atomic electron tomography reconstruction method to experimentally determine the 3D atomic positions of an amorphous solid. Using a multi-component glass-forming alloy as proof of principle, we quantitatively characterize the short- and medium-range order of the 3D atomic arrangement. We observe that, although the 3D atomic packing of the short-range order is geometrically disordered, some short-range-order structures connect with each other to form crystal-like superclusters and give rise to medium-range order. We identify four types of crystal-like medium-range order-face-centred cubic, hexagonal close-packed, body-centred cubic and simple cubic-coexisting in the amorphous sample, showing translational but not orientational order. These observations provide direct experimental evidence to support the general framework of the efficient cluster packing model for metallic glasses
. We expect that this work will pave the way for the determination of the 3D structure of a wide range of amorphous solids, which could transform our fundamental understanding of non-crystalline materials and related phenomena.
Chiral spin textures are fundamentally interesting, with promise for device applications. Stabilizing chirality is conventionally achieved by introducing Dzyaloshinskii–Moriya interaction (DMI) in ...asymmetric multilayers, where the thickness of each layer is at least a few monolayers. Here we report an ultrasensitive chirality switching in (Ni/Co) n multilayer induced by capping with only 0.22 monolayer of Pd. Using spin-polarized low-energy electron microscopy, we monitor the gradual evolution of domain walls from left-handed to right-handed Néel walls and quantify the DMI induced by the Pd capping layer. We also observe the chiral evolution of a skyrmion during the DMI switching, where no significant topological protection is found as the skyrmion winding number varies. This corresponds to a minimum energy cost of <1 attojoule during the skyrmion chirality switching. Our results demonstrate the detailed chirality evolution within skyrmions during the DMI sign switching, which is relevant to practical applications of skyrmionic devices.
Electric‐current‐induced magnetization switching is a keystone concept in the development of spintronics devices. In the last few years this field has experienced a significant boost with the ...discovery of ultrafast domain wall motions and very low threshold currents in structures designed to stabilize chiral spin textures. Imaging domain‐wall spin textures in situ, while fabricating magnetic multilayer structures, is a powerful way to investigate the forces stabilizing this type of chirality, and informs strategies to engineer structures with controlled spin textures. Here, recent results applying spin‐polarized low‐energy electron microscopy to image chiral domain walls in magnetic multilayer films are summarized. Providing a way to measure the strength of the asymmetric exchange interaction that causes the chirality, this approach can be used to tailor the texture and handedness of magnetic domain walls by interface engineering. These results advance understanding of the underlying physics and offer new insights toward the design of spintronic devices.
Magnetic chirality is important because it enables highly efficient current‐driven manipulation of magnetization. Recent progress in tailoring domain‐wall chirality in magnetic multilayers is summarized and the use of magnetization‐vector imaging by spin‐polarized low‐energy electron microscopy is highlighted.
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