Free-standing magnetic nano-membranes for electron spin-filtering applications

Free-standing ferromagnetic nano-membranes with thicknesses below 10 nm could effectively be used for spin selective filtering of electrons. Such membranes can work both as spin detectors in electron-spectroscopy, -microscopy and -diffraction as well as a source of spin polarized electrons. Theoreti...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:arXiv.org 2017-09
Main Authors: Övergaard, T, Wojek, B M, Leandersson, M, Ohldag, H, Bonetti, S, Wiell, T, Tjernberg, O
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Cobalt
Electron spin
Ferromagnetism
Figure of merit
Filtration
Gold
Membranes
Thickness
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Summary:Free-standing ferromagnetic nano-membranes with thicknesses below 10 nm could effectively be used for spin selective filtering of electrons. Such membranes can work both as spin detectors in electron-spectroscopy, -microscopy and -diffraction as well as a source of spin polarized electrons. Theoretical studies and previous work has indicated that ferromagnetic membranes of a few nm have Sherman functions in the 30-60 % range and would provide an effective alternative to current spin detection technology. Here we demonstrate the fabrication of gold capped Co nano-membranes with a 2.6 nm Co layer and a total thickness below 10 nm. The membranes have a Sherman function \(S\approx 0.41\) and a transmission of \(3.7\times 10^{-2}\) for electron energies of 2 eV. The integration of such spin-filtering membranes in a hemispherical electron analyzer is shown to provide massively parallel detection capabilities and a "2-dimensional" figure of merit \(FOM_\mathrm{2D}\) = 67.2, the highest reported to date.
ISSN:2331-8422