Surfaces, interfaces and thin films articles within Nature Communications

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  • Article
    | Open Access

    Chromium tellurides are a particularly promising family of quasi-2D magnetic materials; towards the single van der Waals layer limit, they preserve magnetic ordering, some even above room temperature, and exhibit a variety of intrinsic topological properties. Here, Hang Chi, Yunbo Ou and co-authors demonstrate a strain tunable Berry curvature induced reversal of the anomalous Hall effect in Cr2Te3.

    • Hang Chi
    • , Yunbo Ou
    •  & Jagadeesh S. Moodera

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Superconducting interfaces involving KTaO3 have recently attracted attention due to their relatively high transition temperature. Here, the authors study amorphous-YAlO3/KTaO3 interfaces and find two-fold symmetry in the superconducting regime, possibly due to a mixed-parity superconducting state.

    • Guanqun Zhang
    • , Lijie Wang
    •  & Wei Li

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Designing efficient photonic neuromorphic systems remains a challenge. Here, the authors develop a new class of memristor sensitive to the dual electro-optical history obtained by exploiting electrochemical, photovoltaic and photo-assisted oxygen ion motion effects at a high temperature superconductor / semiconductor interface.

    • Ralph El Hage
    • , Vincent Humbert
    •  & Javier E. Villegas

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In solid-state lithium metal batteries, the crystallization of Li-ions deposited at interfaces remains unclear. Here, authors use molecular dynamics simulations to reveal lithium crystallization pathways and energy barriers, guiding improved interfacial engineering and accelerated crystal growth.

    • Menghao Yang
    • , Yunsheng Liu
    •  & Yifei Mo

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The authors observe spectroscopic signature of obstructed surface states on the (0001) plane of SrIn2P2. Due to structural reconstruction, the surface state undergoes an adiabatic evolution and split into two branches, the upper of which being spatially localized with unusual negative differential conductance.

    • Xiang-Rui Liu
    • , Hanbin Deng
    •  & Chang Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Here, the authors probe the phonon changes across an atomically sharp h-10BN/h-11BN isotope interface with sub-unit-cell spatial resolution and momentum resolution. The observed phonon delocalization suggests strong electron-phonon coupling at isotopic interface.

    • Ning Li
    • , Ruochen Shi
    •  & Peng Gao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Classical hydrodynamics applies to electron fluids as well, provided the system has a high electron–electron collision rate. Now, model calculations show that regimes in which other scattering processes are at play can explain hydrodynamic electron transport in thin flakes of the 2D material WTe2.

    • Yotam Wolf
    • , Amit Aharon-Steinberg
    •  & Tobias Holder

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Sensing and processing UV light is essential for advanced artificial visual perception system. Here, the authors report a controllable UV-ultrasensitive neuromorphic vision sensor using organic phototransistors to integrate sensing, memory and processing functions, and perform the static image and dynamic movie recognition.

    • Ting Jiang
    • , Yiru Wang
    •  & Wenping Hu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In order to be used on a large scale, unclonable tags for anti-counterfeiting should allow mass production at low cost, as well as fast and easy authentication. Here, the authors show how to use one-step annealing of gold films to quickly realize robust tags with high capacity, allowing fast deep-learning based authentication via smartphone readout.

    • Ningfei Sun
    • , Ziyu Chen
    •  & Qian Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Superconductivity has been discovered in atomically thin two-dimensional van der Waals materials by resistance measurements, but magnetic measurements are lacking. Here, the authors use a micron-scale SQUID magnetometer to measure the superfluid response of exfoliated MoS2.

    • Alexander Jarjour
    • , G. M. Ferguson
    •  & Katja C. Nowack

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A linear Hall response in isolated systems with time reversal symmetry is forbidden by Onsager relations. Here the authors show that this restriction is lifted by interlayer hopping in twisted bilayers, leading to a linear charge Hall effect under time reversal symmetry.

    • Dawei Zhai
    • , Cong Chen
    •  & Wang Yao

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Ferroelectric hafnia-based thin films are promising for applications in memories and neuromorphic devices due to their robust ferroelectricity at reduced dimensions. Here, the authors demonstrate stabilization of the metastable orthorhombic phase in Hf0.5 Zr0.5O2 films by interface engineering with a hole doping mechanism.

    • Shu Shi
    • , Haolong Xi
    •  & Jingsheng Chen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A nonreciprocal critical current is known as the superconducting diode effect (SDE). Here, the authors use SQUID-on-tip to study SDE in a EuS/Nb bilayer and find that the stray field from magnetized EuS creates screening currents in the Nb, which lead to SDE by affecting vortex flow dynamics.

    • Alon Gutfreund
    • , Hisakazu Matsuki
    •  & Yonathan Anahory

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The discovery of superconductivity in the infinite-layer nickelates reignites an interest in the nickelates as cuprate analogues. Here, the authors investigate the role of epitaxial strain in the synthesis of the n=3 layered nickelate, Nd4Ni3O8.

    • Dan Ferenc Segedin
    • , Berit H. Goodge
    •  & Julia A. Mundy

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Spin ice compounds are typically insulating and introducing carriers can destroy the spin ice state, making integration into electronic devices problematic. Here the authors report a transport response to an ice-rule-breaking transition in a heterostructure of a pyrochlore spin ice and a nonmagnetic metal.

    • Han Zhang
    • , Chengkun Xing
    •  & Jian Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Signatures of an excitonic insulator have been reported in several two-dimensional materials. Here the authors report electronic properties of monolayer ZrTe2 from ARPES and STM measurements that are consistent with the preformed exciton gas phase, a precursor for the excitonic insulator.

    • Yekai Song
    • , Chunjing Jia
    •  & Shujie Tang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    A distinct dependence of the superconducting transition temperature on carrier density for electron gases formed at KTaO3 interfaces is reported. In addition, these interfaces are shown to play a role in mediating superconductivity in this system. The crystallographic orientation and carrier density dependent superconductivity at KTaO3 interfaces can be explained by Cooper pairing via inter-orbital interactions and quantum confinement.

    • Changjiang Liu
    • , Xianjing Zhou
    •  & Anand Bhattacharya

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Quantum anomalous Hall junctions show great promise for advancing next-generation electronic circuits. Here, the authors demonstrate a scalable method for synthesizing heterostructures of magnetic topological insulators with regions of distinct Chern numbers and characterize the chiral interface modes that emerge at the interface.

    • Yi-Fan Zhao
    • , Ruoxi Zhang
    •  & Cui-Zu Chang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Constructing atomically flat surface in a single crystal ultrathin film is difficult owing to the coherent merging of trillions of clusters. Here the authors establish the initial growth mechanism of a single crystal Cu thin film with atomically flat surface using atomic sputtering epitaxy.

    • Taewoo Ha
    • , Yu-Seong Seo
    •  & Se-Young Jeong

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Magnet/superconductor hybrids have been explored for the realization of topological superconductivity but have mainly focused on ferromagnets with full gaps. Here, the authors find that the antiferromagnet/superconductor heterostructure of monolayer Mn on a Nb(110) surface is a topological nodal-point superconductor.

    • Maciej Bazarnik
    • , Roberto Lo Conte
    •  & Roland Wiesendanger

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Weak interlayer van der Waals (vdW) bonding has significant impact on the structure and properties of vdW layered materials. Here authors use in-situ aberration-corrected ADF-STEM for an atomistic insight into the cation diffusion in the vdW gaps and the etching of vdW surfaces at high temperatures.

    • Wenjun Cui
    • , Weixiao Lin
    •  & Xiahan Sang

  • Article
    | Open Access

    By placing an antiferromagnet next to a heavy metal such as platinum, magnetic excitations in the antiferromagnet drive a spin current in the heavy metal, leading to terahertz emission. Here, Kholid et al study the terahertz emission of two antiferromagnets, KCoF3 and KNiF3 with very different magnon frequencies, and find that the opening of a gap in the magnon density of states drastically alters the spin-transfer efficiency.

    • Farhan Nur Kholid
    • , Dominik Hamara
    •  & Chiara Ciccarelli

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Mica is a naturally occurring 2D mineral that has been heavily studied in many diverse areas. Here authors present atomic force microscopy images to study the mica surface in ultra-high vacuum conditions; they unveil the distribution of its surface K+ ions and give insights into the distribution of subsurface Al3+ ions.

    • Giada Franceschi
    • , Pavel Kocán
    •  & Ulrike Diebold

  • Article
    | Open Access

    One particularly useful feature of van der Waals materials is the ability to combine layers of different materials into a single heterostructure, which can have superior properties than any of the constituent materials alone. Here, Cheng et al. combine two interlayer-antiferromagnetic chromium trihalides, CrI3 and CrCl3 in close proximity, and demonstrate ferromagnetic coupling between them.

    • Guanghui Cheng
    • , Mohammad Mushfiqur Rahman
    •  & Yong P. Chen

  • Article
    | Open Access

    One of the possible events signaling a neutrinoless double beta decay is a Xe atom decaying into a Ba ion and two electrons. Aiming at the realisation of a detector for such a process, the authors show that Ba ions can be efficiently trapped (chelated) in vacuum by an organic molecule layer on a surface.

    • P. Herrero-Gómez
    • , J. P. Calupitan
    •  & J. T. White

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The Su-Schrieffer-Heeger (SSH) model is a prototypical model of topological states, initially proposed to describe spinless electrons on a one-dimensional (1D) dimerized lattice. Here, the authors realize a 2D SSH model in a rectangular lattice of silicon atoms on a silver substrate, observing gapped Dirac cones by angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy.

    • Daiyu Geng
    • , Hui Zhou
    •  & Baojie Feng

  • Article
    | Open Access

    How confinement affects the growth of crystals is poorly understood. Experiments in which NaClO3 and CaCO3 crystals are grown close to a glass substrate now show that new molecular layers can form via the transport of mass through the liquid film at the crystal-substrate interface.

    • Felix Kohler
    • , Olivier Pierre-Louis
    •  & Dag Kristian Dysthe

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Three dimensional topological spin textures, such as hopfions and skyrmion tubes, have seen a surge of interest for their potential technological applications. They offer greater flexibility than their two dimensional counterparts, but have been hampered by the limited material platforms. Here, Grelier et al. look at aperiodic multilayers, and observe a three dimensional skyrmionic cocoon.

    • Matthieu Grelier
    • , Florian Godel
    •  & Nicolas Reyren

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Here, the authors attribute the ambient surface contamination of van der Waals materials to a self-organized molecular layer of normal alkanes with lengths of 20-26 carbon atoms. The alkane adlayer displaces the manifold other airborne contaminant species, capping the surface of graphene, graphite, hBN and MoS2.

    • András Pálinkás
    • , György Kálvin
    •  & Péter Nemes-Incze

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Twisted double bilayer graphene (tDBG) comprises two Bernal-stacked bilayer graphene sheets with a twist between them. Here, the authors report a strong anomalous Hall effect in the correlated-metal regime of tDBG, indicating time reversal symmetry breaking from orbital ferromagnetism, likely associated with valley polarization.

    • Manabendra Kuiri
    • , Christopher Coleman
    •  & Joshua Folk

  • Article
    | Open Access

    As the thickness of a three-dimensional (3D) topological insulator (TI) becomes comparable to the penetration depth of surface states, hybridization turns their gapless Dirac electronic structure into a gapped spectrum. Here, authors show that 2D topological states can exist in the 3D TI BiSbTeSe2 when the Fermi level is inside the hybridization gap.

    • Su Kong Chong
    • , Lizhe Liu
    •  & Vikram V. Deshpande

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Deep understanding of defect physics, excitonic properties and the ultrafast carrier dynamics in the high mobility p-type transparent CuI is vital for its optoelectronic applications. Here, Liu et al. employ a synergistic approach to unveil these fundamental properties.

    • Zhan Hua Li
    • , Jia Xing He
    •  & Chao Ping Liu

  • Article
    | Open Access

    In one-dimensional systems, electronic interactions lead to a breakdown of Fermi liquid theory and the formation of a Tomonaga Luttinger Liquid (TLL), as recently reported in the helical edge states of quantum spin Hall insulators. Here, the authors show that the many-body interactions in the helical TLL of 1T’- WTe2 can be effectively controlled by the dielectric screening via the substrate.

    • Junxiang Jia
    • , Elizabeth Marcellina
    •  & Bent Weber

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Predicting structures and stabilities of solid-solid interfaces presents an ongoing and increasingly important challenge for development of new technologies. Here authors report an unconstrained and generally applicable non-periodic screening method for systematic exploration of material´s interfaces.

    • Giovanni Di Liberto
    • , Ángel Morales-García
    •  & Stefan T. Bromley

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Vibronic coupling in molecules plays an essential role in photophysics. Here, the authors observe optical fingerprints of the coupling between librational states and charged excited states in a single phthalocyanine molecule chirally absorbed on a surface.

    • Jiří Doležal
    • , Sofia Canola
    •  & Martin Švec

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Multi-Q states are 2D typically non-collinear spin textures that can be stabilized at the nanoscale and at zero magnetic field by interactions between multiple spins. Gutzeit et al. uncover a variety of multi-Q states in Fe/Rh atomic bilayers on the Ir(111) surface, including unexpected 2D collinear states.

    • Mara Gutzeit
    • , André Kubetzka
    •  & Kirsten von Bergmann

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The interface between perovskite-oxide SrTiO3 and other oxides realizes efficient spin-to-charge current conversion; however, the typically insulating oxides hinder the propagation of spin-currents. Here the authors achieve a record efficiency by replacing an oxide insulator with a strongly-correlated polar metal.

    • Shingo Kaneta-Takada
    • , Miho Kitamura
    •  & Shinobu Ohya

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Evaporation and crystal growth occur at different rates on different surfaces. Here authors show dissociative evaporation from ZnO (0001) polar surfaces is accelerated by the formation of a Zn-deficient quasi-liquid layer derived from the formation and inward diffusion of Zn vacancies that stabilize the polar surface.

    • Zhen Wang
    • , Jinho Byun
    •  & Sang Ho Oh

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The effect of aliovalent doping on grain boundary is not yet fully understood at the atomic level. Here, the authors report grain boundary structural transformation in α-Al2O3 is induced by co-segregation of multiple dopants using atomic-resolution electron microscopy and theoretical calculations.

    • Toshihiro Futazuka
    • , Ryo Ishikawa
    •  & Yuichi Ikuhara

  • Article
    | Open Access

    Van der Waals heterostructures made of 2D materials offer a rich platform for the study of novel proximity effects. Here, by means of Hall effect measurements, the authors show a proximity-induced ferromagnetic/ferrovalley ground state with spontaneous spin-valley polarization in a V5Se8/NbSe2 heterostructure.

    • Hideki Matsuoka
    • , Tetsuro Habe
    •  & Masaki Nakano

  • Article
    | Open Access

    The spectrally narrow photoluminescence lines occurring in transition metal dichalcogenides (TMD) heterostructures at low temperature have been attributed to interlayer excitons (IXs) localized by the moiré potential between the TMD layers. Here, the authors show that these lines are present even when the moiré potential is suppressed by inserting an hBN spacer between the TMD layers.

    • Fateme Mahdikhanysarvejahany
    • , Daniel N. Shanks
    •  & John R. Schaibley

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