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Supramolecular control of the magnetic anisotropy in two-dimensional high-spin Fe arrays at a metal interface

Nature Materials volume 8, pages 189–193 (2009)Cite this article

Abstract

Magnetic atoms at surfaces are a rich model system for solid-state magnetic bits exhibiting either classical1,2 or quantum3,4 behaviour. Individual atoms, however, are difficult to arrange in regular patterns1,2,3,4,5. Moreover, their magnetic properties are dominated by interaction with the substrate, which, as in the case of Kondo systems, often leads to a decrease or quench of their local magnetic moment6,7. Here, we show that the supramolecular assembly of Fe and 1,4-benzenedicarboxylic acid molecules on a Cu surface results in ordered arrays of high-spin mononuclear Fe centres on a 1.5 nm square grid. Lateral coordination with the molecular ligands yields unsaturated yet stable coordination bonds, which enable chemical modification of the electronic and magnetic properties of the Fe atoms independently from the substrate. The easy magnetization direction of the Fe centres can be switched by oxygen adsorption, thus opening a way to control the magnetic anisotropy in supramolecular layers akin to that used in metallic thin films8,9,10,11.

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Figure 1: Planar supramolecular layers of Fe–TPA complexes self-assembled on Cu(100).
Figure 2: Circularly polarized X-ray absorption spectra of Fe(TPA)4, O2–Fe(TPA)4 and Fe/Cu(100) measured at the Fe L2,3-edge and calculated multiplet structure.
Figure 3: Element-selective magnetization curves of the Fe centres and crystal-field diagrams.

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Acknowledgements

We acknowledge the ESRF for provision of beam time. Partial financial support was received through the EUROCORES 05-SONS-FP-009 SANMAG project of the European Science Foundation. P.G. and S.S. acknowledge financial support from the Spanish Ministerio de Educación y Ciencia (SYNSPIN—MAT2007-62341).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Centre d’Investigacions en Nanociència i Nanotecnologia (ICN-CSIC), UAB Campus, E-08193 Barcelona, Spain

    Pietro Gambardella & Sebastian Stepanow

  2. Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ICREA), E-08010 Barcelona, Spain

    Pietro Gambardella

  3. Institut de Physique des Nanostructures, Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL), CH-1015 Lausanne, Switzerland

    Pietro Gambardella, Sylvain Clair, Stéphane Pons, Harald Brune & Klaus Kern

  4. Max-Planck-Institut für Festkörperforschung, D-70569 Stuttgart, Germany

    Sebastian Stepanow, Alexandre Dmitriev, Jan Honolka, Magalí Lingenfelder, Nian Lin & Klaus Kern

  5. Department of Applied Physics, Chalmers University of Technology, 41296 Göteborg, Sweden

    Alexandre Dmitriev

  6. Department of Chemistry, Utrecht University, 3584 CA Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Frank M. F. de Groot

  7. Solid State and Structural Chemistry Unit, Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore 560 012, India

    Subhra Sen Gupta & D. D. Sarma

  8. European Synchrotron Radiation Facility, BP 200, F-38043 Grenoble, France

    Peter Bencok & Stefan Stanescu

  9. Institut de Minéralogie et de Physique des Milieux Condensé, Université Pierre et Marie Curie, F-75252 Paris, France

    Ari P. Seitsonen

  10. Physik-Department E20, Technische Universität München, D-85748 Garching, Germany

    Johannes V. Barth

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Correspondence to Pietro Gambardella.

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Gambardella, P., Stepanow, S., Dmitriev, A. et al. Supramolecular control of the magnetic anisotropy in two-dimensional high-spin Fe arrays at a metal interface. Nature Mater 8, 189–193 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat2376

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