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Topological insulators

Engineered heterostructures

Nature Materials volume 16, pages 3–4 (2017)Cite this article

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The combination of topological properties and magnetic order can lead to new quantum states and exotic physical phenomena. In particular, the coupling between topological insulators and antiferromagnets enables magnetic and electronic structural engineering.

Topology, a branch of mathematics that deals with smoothly deformable objects, has turned out to be of great relevance to modern physics. Phases of matter were predicted and experimentally confirmed that are protected by their built-in topological electronic structures. Topological insulators are bulk insulators with gapless, topologically protected surface states, which not only host exotic quantum states, but also have the potential for new electronic and spintronic device applications, for which the term topotronics has recently been coined. A crucial requirement for unlocking some of their most intriguing properties and effects is the breaking of time-reversal symmetry — for instance, by magnetic doping. Now, Qing Lin He and colleagues1 report a way of raising the magnetic ordering temperature in these materials by constructing a 'lasagne' of the magnetic topological insulator Cr:(Bi,Sb)2Te3 and the antiferromagnet CrSb to seamlessly realize proximity-coupling.

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Figure 1: Topological surface states in a topological insulator and quantum anomalous Hall effect.
Figure 2: Magnetic topological insulators coupled through an antiferromagnetic layer.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, Thorsten Hesjedal and Yulin Chen are at the Clarendon Laboratory, University of Oxford, Parks Road, Oxford OX1 3PU, UK,

    Thorsten Hesjedal & Yulin Chen

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  1. Thorsten Hesjedal
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  2. Yulin Chen
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Correspondence to Thorsten Hesjedal or Yulin Chen.

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Hesjedal, T., Chen, Y. Engineered heterostructures. Nature Mater 16, 3–4 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat4835

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