Self-regulated growth of candidate topological superconducting parkerite by molecular beam epitaxy

• Published in: APL materials 2021-10, Vol.9 (10)
• Main Authors: Lapano, Jason, Pai, Yun-Yi, Mazza, Alessandro R., Zhang, Jie, Isaacs-Smith, Tamara, Gemperline, Patrick, Zhang, Lizhi, Li, Haoxiang, Lee, Ho Nyung, Eres, Gyula, Yoon, Mina, Comes, Ryan, Ward, T. Zac, Lawrie, Benjamin J., McGuire, Michael A., Moore, II, Robert G., Nelson, Christopher T., May, Andrew F., Brahlek, Matthew
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: CONDENSED MATTER PHYSICS, SUPERCONDUCTIVITY AND SUPERFLUIDITY
• ISSN: 2166-532X; 2166-532X

Ternary chalcogenides, such as parkerites and shandites, are a broad class of materials exhibiting a rich diversity of transport and magnetic behavior and an array of topological phases, including Weyl and Dirac nodes. However, they remain largely unexplored as high-quality epitaxial thin films. Here, we report the self-regulated growth of thin films of the strong spin–orbit coupled superconductor Pd3Bi2Se2 on SrTiO3 by molecular beam epitaxy. Films are found to grow in a self-regulated fashion, where, in excess Se, the temperature and relative flux ratio of Pd to Bi control the formation of Pd3Bi2Se2 due to the combined volatility of Bi, Se, and Bi–Se bonded phases. The resulting films are shown to be of high structural quality, and the stoichiometry is independent of the Pd:Bi and Se flux ratio and exhibits a superconducting transition temperature of 800 mK and a critical field of 17.7 ± 0.5 mT, as probed by transport and magnetometry. Understanding and navigating the growth of the chemically and structurally diverse classes of ternary chalcogenides open a vast space for discovering new phenomena and enabling new applications.