Electronic and magnetic properties of the Co/Fe(001) interface and the role of oxygen

Effect of oxygen on the magnetic coupling of a Mn thin film on Fe(001) substrate

“…Moreover, it was reported that the surface oxygen acts as a surfactant in room-temperature Fe homoepitaxy, improving considerably the surface order and enhancing the magnetic properties of the topmost Fe layers. Co grown on bare Fe(0 0 1) was found to turn to hcp structure from a distorted cubic one at about 15 ML but when grown on oxidized Fe(0 0 1) surface it shows a similar behaviour with an extended stability range up to about 35 ML [49,53]. The ubiquitous presence of oxygen even under high vacuum in experiments and the role of chemisorbed oxygen as a catalyst in chemical reactions are the motives, inter alia, behind recent active research in the subject.…”

Epitaxial growth and characterization of CoO/Fe(001) thin film layered structures

“…This would be due to the lower electronegativity of Fe compared to Co [6]. We could expect, in the present case, to induce the formation of iron oxides with different valence character, and also of mixed compounds and alloys, such as CoFe which is known to form when heating a Co/Fe interface [22]. An evaluation of the compounds forming at the interface can be made by reconstructing the core levels XPS lineshape as a sum of known reference spectra.…”

Self-organized nano-structuring of CoO islands on Fe(001)

“…In such a thickness range, Co is known to grow pseudomorphically on the Fe substrate [33,34], with a body centered tetragonal (bct) structure and the same inplane lattice parameter as bulk Fe (a Fe = 0.287 nm). The growth of thin Co films on Fe(001)-p(1 × 1)O is known to proceed in a layer-by-layer (also known as Frank-van der Merwe) mode, as demonstrated by former studies [33,35] and confirmed by our STM observations [36]. The Co growth was performed at RT by means of MBE through an e-beam evaporator in UHV (base pressure in the 10 −9 Pa range), then the sample was heated at 470 K for about 5 minutes.…”