The origin of the dead-layer at the La0.67Sr0.33MnO3/SrTiO3 interface and dead-layer reduction via interfacial engineering

Abstract

Transition metal oxide hetero-structure has great potential for multifunctional devices. However, the degraded physical properties at interface, known as dead-layer behavior, present a main obstacle for device applications. Here we present the systematic study of the dead-layer behavior in La0.67Sr0.33MnO3 thin film grown on SrTiO3 substrate with ozone assisted molecular beam epitaxy. We found that the evolution of electric and magnetic properties as a function of thickness shows a remarkable resemblance to the phase diagram as a function of doping for bulk materials, providing compelling evidences of the hole depletion in near interface layers that causes dead-layer. Detailed electronic and surface structure studies indicate that the hole depletion is due to the intrinsic oxygen vacancy formation. Furthermore, we show that oxygen vacancies are partly caused by interfacial electric dipolar field, and thus by doping-engineering at the single-atomic-layer level, we demonstrate the dead-layer reduction in films with higher interfacial hole concentration.

6 pages, 5 figures

References in corpus (9)

• Magnetic effects at the interface between nonmagnetic oxides
• Critical thickness and orbital ordering in ultrathin La0.7Sr0.3MnO3 films
• Evidence of orbital reconstruction at interfaces in La0.67Sr0.33MnO3 films
• High temperature magnetic insulating phase in ultrathin La0.67Sr0.33MnO3 films
• Termination Control of the Interface Dipole in La${}_{0.7}$Sr${}_{0.3}$MnO${}_3$/Nb:SrTiO${}_3$ (001) Schottky Junctions
• Competing misfit relaxation mechanisms in epitaxial correlated oxides
• Preventing the reconstruction of the polar discontinuity at oxide heterointerfaces
• Determining the Curie temperature of La0.67Sr0.33MnO3 thin films
• Optimal interface doping at La_2/3Sr_1/3MnO_3/SrTiO_3(001) heterojunctions for spintronic applications

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