Fabrication of a novel magnetic topological heterostructure and temperature evolution of its massive Dirac cone

平原 徹*; Otrokov, M. M.*; 佐々木 泰祐*; 角田 一樹*; 友弘 雄太*; 日下 翔太郎*; 奥山 裕磨*; 一ノ倉 聖*; 小林 正起*; 竹田 幸治; et al.

Nature Communications (Internet), 11, p.4821_1 - 4821_8, 2020/09

https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-020-18645-9

We fabricate a novel magnetic topological heterostructure MnBiTe/BiTe where multiple magnetic layers are inserted into the topmost quintuple layer of the original topological insulator BiTe. A massive Dirac cone (DC) with a gap of 40-75 meV at 16 K is observed. By tracing the temperature evolution, this gap is shown to gradually decrease with increasing temperature and a blunt transition from a massive to a massless DC occurs around 200-250 K. Magnetic measurements show that there are two distinct Mn components in the system that corresponds to the two heterostructures; MnBiTe/BiTe is paramagnetic at 6 K while MnBiTe/BiTe is ferromagnetic with a negative hysteresis (critical temperature 20 K). This novel heterostructure is potentially important for future device applications.