Short-range magnetic interaction in a monolayer 1-VSe film revealed by element-specific X-ray magnetic circular dichroism

Sumida, Kazuki   ; Takeda, Yukiharu   ; Kusaka, Shotaro*; Kobayashi, Katsuyoshi*; Hirahara, Toru*

We investigated the intrinsic magnetic properties of the two-dimensional ferromagnetic candidate monolayer 1-VSe films using X-ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD), an element-specific magnetic probe. By performing high-resolution measurements, we succeeded in detecting a clear XMCD signal from the atomically thin 1-VSe films under an external magnetic field. Through manipulation of the X-ray incidence angle, we were able to disentangle the in-plane and out-of-plane magnetic properties and found a strong magnetic anisotropy. Moreover, magnetic field- and temperature-dependent XMCD revealed that there is no long-range ferromagnetic ordering even at 6 K, but short-range ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic interactions between neighboring vanadium ions exist. Such low-temperature magnetic behavior signifies that the monolayer 1-VSe is on the verge of ferromagnetism, and this fact accounts for the reported ferromagnetism in VSe-based heterostructures.