Abstract:Unexpected ferromagnetism has been observed in carbon doped ZnO films grown by pulsed laser deposition [Phys. Rev. Lett. 99, 127201 (2007)]. In this letter, we introduce carbon into ZnO films by ion implantation. Room temperature ferromagnetism has been observed. Our analysis demonstrates that (1) C-doped ferromagnetic ZnO can be achieved by an alternative method, i.e. ion implantation, and (2) the chemical involvement of carbon in the ferromagnetism is indirectly proven.
Nowadays ferromagnetism is often found in potential diluted magnetic
semiconductor systems. However, many authors argue that the observed
ferromagnetism stems from ferromagnetic precipitates or spinodal decomposition
rather than from carrier mediated magnetic impurities, as required for a
diluted magnetic semiconductor. In the present paper we answer this question
for Fe-implanted ZnO single crystals comprehensively. Different implantation
fluences and temperatures and post-implantation annealing temperatures have
been chosen in order to evaluate the structural and magnetic properties over a
wide range of parameters. Three different regimes with respect to the Fe
concentration and the process temperature are found: 1) Disperse Fe$^{2+}$ and
Fe$^{3+}$ at low Fe concentrations and low processing temperatures, 2)
FeZn$_2$O$_4$ at very high processing temperatures and 3) an intermediate
regime with a co-existence of metallic Fe (Fe$^0$) and ionic Fe (Fe$^{2+}$ and
Fe$^{3+}$). Ferromagnetism is only observed in the latter two cases, where
inverted ZnFe$_2$O$_4$ and $\alpha$-Fe nanocrystals are the origin of the
observed ferromagnetic behavior, respectively. The ionic Fe in the last case
could contribute to a carrier mediated coupling. However, their separation is
too large to couple ferromagnetically due to the lack of p-type carrier. For
comparison investigations of Fe-implanted epitaxial ZnO thin films are
presented.Comment: 14 pages, 17 figure
The effect of Ge deposition rate on the morphology and structural properties of self-assembled Ge/Si(001) islands was studied. Ge/Si(001) layers were grown by solid-source molecular-beam epitaxy at 500 °C. We adjusted the Ge coverage, 6 monolayers (ML), and varied the Ge growth rate by a factor of 100, R = 0.02-2 ML s(-1), to produce films consisting of hut-shaped Ge islands. The samples were characterized by scanning tunnelling microscopy, Raman spectroscopy, and Rutherford backscattering measurements. The mean lateral size of Ge nanoclusters decreases from 14.1 nm at R = 0.02 ML s(-1) to 9.8 nm at R = 2 ML s(-1). The normalized width of the size distribution shows non-monotonic behaviour as a function of R and has a minimum value of 19% at R = 2 ML s(-1). Ge nanoclusters fabricated at the highest deposition rate demonstrate the best structural quality and the highest Ge content (∼0.9).
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