Zhou Hangyu, Dos Santos Dias Manuel, Zhang Youguang, Zhao Weisheng, Lounis Samir
Peter Grünberg Institut and Institute for Advanced Simulations, Forschungszentrum Jülich & JARA, 52425, Jülich, Germany.
School of Electronic and Information Engineering, Beihang University, Beijing, 100191, China.
Nat Commun. 2024 Jun 6;15(1):4854. doi: 10.1038/s41467-024-48973-z.
The kagome lattice is an exciting solid state physics platform for the emergence of nontrivial quantum states driven by electronic correlations: topological effects, unconventional superconductivity, charge and spin density waves, and unusual magnetic states such as quantum spin liquids. While kagome lattices have been realized in complex multi-atomic bulk compounds, here we demonstrate from first-principles a process that we dub kagomerization, in which we fabricate a two-dimensional kagome lattice in monolayers of transition metals utilizing an hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) overlayer. Surprisingly, h-BN induces a large rearrangement of the transition metal atoms supported on a fcc(111) heavy-metal surface. This reconstruction is found to be rather generic for this type of heterostructures and has a profound impact on the underlying magnetic properties, ultimately stabilizing various topological magnetic solitons such as skyrmions and bimerons. Our findings call for a reconsideration of h-BN as merely a passive capping layer, showing its potential for not only reconstructing the atomic structure of the underlying material, e.g. through the kagomerization of magnetic films, but also enabling electronic and magnetic phases that are highly sought for the next generation of device technologies.
Kagome晶格是一个令人兴奋的固态物理平台，用于研究由电子关联驱动的非平凡量子态的出现：拓扑效应、非常规超导、电荷和自旋密度波，以及诸如量子自旋液体等不寻常的磁态。虽然Kagome晶格已在复杂的多原子块状化合物中实现，但在此我们从第一性原理证明了一个我们称之为Kagome化的过程，即在过渡金属单层中利用六方氮化硼（h-BN）覆盖层制造二维Kagome晶格。令人惊讶的是，h-BN会引起支撑在fcc(111)重金属表面上的过渡金属原子的大量重新排列。这种重构被发现对于这类异质结构相当普遍，并且对其底层磁性能有深远影响，最终稳定了各种拓扑磁孤子，如斯格明子和双聚子。我们的发现要求重新审视h-BN仅仅作为一个无源覆盖层的观点，这表明它不仅有潜力通过磁性薄膜的Kagome化来重构底层材料的原子结构，还能实现下一代器件技术所高度追求的电子和磁相。
