Enhanced Exchange Bias in Epitaxial High-Entropy Oxide Heterostructures

作者：Hailin Wang, Haoliang Huang, Yanpeng Feng, Yu‐Chieh Ku, Cheng‐En Liu, Shanquan Chen, Alan Farhan, Cínthia Piamonteze, Yalin Lu, Yun‐Long Tang, Jun Wei, Lang Chen, C. F. Chang, Chang‐Yang Kuo, Zuhuang Chen · 发表于：ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces · 年份：2023 · DOI：10.1021/acsami.3c14943 · 被引用次数：8 · 研究领域：High Entropy Alloys Studies、Magnetic and transport properties of perovskites and related materials、High-Temperature Coating Behaviors

High-entropy oxides (HEOs) have gained significant interest in recent years due to their unique structural characteristics and potential to tailor functional properties. However, the electronic structure of the HEOs currently remains vastly unknown. In this work, combining magnetometry measurements, scanning transmission electron microscopy, and element-specific X-ray absorption spectroscopy, the electronic structure and magnetic properties of the perovskite-HEO La(Cr 0.2 Mn 0.2 Fe 0.2 Co 0.2 Ni 0.2 )O 3 epitaxial thin films are systemically studied. It is found that enhanced magnetic frustration emerges from competing exchange interactions of the five transition-metal cations with energetically favorable half-filled/full-filled electron configurations, resulting in an unprecedented large vertical exchange bias effect in the single-crystalline films. Furthermore, our findings demonstrate that the La(Cr 0.2 Mn 0.2 Fe 0.2 Co 0.2 Ni 0.2 )O 3 layer with a thickness down to 1 nm can be used as a pinning layer and strongly coupled with a ferromagnetic La 0.7 Sr 0.3 MnO 3 layer, leading to a notable exchange bias and coercivity enhancement in a cooling field as small as 5 Oe. Our studies not only provide invaluable insight into the electronic structure of HEOs but also pave the way for a new era of large bias materials for spintronics devices.