73.40.-c Electronic transport in interface structures
Refine
Has Fulltext
- yes (2)
Is part of the Bibliography
- yes (2)
Document Type
- Doctoral Thesis (2)
Language
- English (2)
Keywords
- Röntgen-Photoelektronenspektroskopie (2) (remove)
Institute
Due to their complex chemical structure transition metal oxides display many fascinating properties which conventional semiconductors lack.
For this reason transition metal oxides hold a lot of promise for novel electronic functionalities.
Just as in conventional semiconductor heterostructures, the interfaces between different materials play a key role in oxide electronics.
The textbook example is the (001) interface between the band insulators LaAlO\(_3\) and SrTiO\(_3\) at which a two-dimensional electron system (2DES) forms.
In order to utilize such a 2DES in prospective electronic devices, it is vital that the electronic properties of the interface can be controlled and manipulated at will.
Employing photoelectron spectroscopy as well as electronic transport measurements, this thesis examines how such interface engineering can be realized in the case of the LaAlO\(_3\)/SrTiO\(_3\) heterostructure:
By photoemission we manage to unambiguously distinguish the different mechanisms by which SrTiO\(_3\) can be doped with electrons.
An electronic reconstruction is identified as the driving mechanism to render stoichiometric LaAlO\(_3\)/SrTiO\(_3\) interfaces metallic.
The doping of the LaAlO\(_3\)/SrTiO\(_3\) heterointerface can furthermore be finely adjusted by changing the oxygen vacancy \(V_{\mathrm{O}}\) concentration in the heterostructure.
Combining intense x-ray irradiation with oxygen dosing, we even achieve control over the \(V_{\mathrm{O}}\) concentration and, consequently, the doping in the photoemission experiment itself.
Exploiting this method, we investigate how the band diagram of SrTiO\(_3\)-based heterostructures changes as a function of the \(V_{\mathrm{O}}\) concentration and temperature by hard x-ray photoemission spectroscopy.
With the band bending in the SrTiO\(_3\) substrate changing as a function of the \(V_{\mathrm{O}}\) concentration, the interfacial band alignment is found to vary as well.
The relative permittivity of the SrTiO\(_3\) substrate and, in particular, its dependence on temperature and electric field is identified as one of the essential parameters determining the electronic interface properties.
That is also why the sample temperature affects the charge carrier distribution.
The mobile charge carriers are shown to shift toward the SrTiO\(_3\) bulk when the sample temperature is lowered.
This effect is, however, only pronounced if the total charge carrier concentration is small.
At high charge carrier concentrations the charge carriers are always confined to the interface, independent of the sample temperature.
The dependence of the electronic interface properties on the \(V_{\mathrm{O}}\) concentration is also investigated by a complementary method, viz. by electronic transport measurements.
These experiments confirm that the mobile charge carrier concentration increases concomitantly to the \(V_{\mathrm{O}}\) concentration.
The mobility of the charge carriers changes as well depending on the \(V_{\mathrm{O}}\) concentration.
Comparing spectroscopy and transport results, we are able to draw conclusions about the processes limiting the mobility in electronic transport.
We furthermore build a memristor device from our LaAlO\(_3\)/SrTiO\(_3\) heterostructures and demonstrate how interface engineering is used in practice in such novel electronic applications.
This thesis furthermore investigates how the electronic structure of the 2DES is affected by the interface topology:
We show that, akin to the (001) LaAlO\(_3\)/SrTiO\(_3\) heterointerface, an electronic reconstruction also renders the (111) interface between LaAlO\(_3\) and SrTiO\(_3\) metallic.
The change in interface topology becomes evident in the Fermi surface of the buried 2DES which is probed by soft x-ray photoemission.
Based on the asymmetry in the Fermi surface, we estimate the extension of the conductive layer in the (111)-oriented LaAlO\(_3\)/SrTiO\(_3\) heterostructure.
The spectral function measured furthermore identifies the charge carriers at the interface as large polarons.
Oxide heterostructures attract a lot of attention as they display a vast range of physical phenomena like conductivity, magnetism, or even superconductivity. In most cases, these effects are caused by electron correlations and are therefore interesting for studying fundamental physics, but also in view of future applications. This thesis deals with the growth and characterization of several prototypical oxide heterostructures. Fe3O4 is highly ranked as a possible spin electrode in the field of spintronics. A suitable semiconductor for spin injection in combination with Fe3O4 is ZnO due to its oxide character and a sufficiently long spin coherence length. Fe3O4 has been grown successfully on ZnO using pulsed laser deposition and molecular beam epitaxy by choosing the oxygen partial pressure adequately. Here, a pressure variation during growth reduces an FeO-like interface layer. Fe3O4 films grow in an island-like growth mode and are structurally nearly fully relaxed, exhibiting the same lattice constants as the bulk materials. Despite the presence of a slight oxygen off-stoichiometry, indications of the Verwey transition hint at high-quality film properties. The overall magnetization of the films is reduced compared to bulk Fe3O4 and a slow magnetization behavior is observed, most probably due to defects like anti-phase boundaries originating from the initial island growth. LaAlO3/SrTiO3 heterostructures exhibit a conducting interface above a critical film thickness, which is most likely explained by an electronic reconstruction. In the corresponding model, the potential built-up owing to the polar LaAlO3 overlayer is compensated by a charge transfer from the film surface to the interface. The properties of these heterostructures strongly depend on the growth parameters. It is shown for the first time, that it is mainly the total pressure which determines the macroscopic sample properties, while it is the oxygen partial pressure which controls the amount of charge carriers near the interface. Oxygen-vacancy-mediated conductivity is found for too low oxygen pressures. A too high total pressure, however, destroys interface conductivity, most probably due to a change of the growth kinetics. Post-oxidation leads to a metastable state removing the arbitrariness in controlling the electronic interface properties by the oxygen pressure during growth. LaVO3/SrTiO3 heterostructures exhibit similar behavior compared to LaAlO3/SrTiO3 when it comes to a thickness-dependent metal-insulator transition. But in contrast to LaAlO3, LaVO3 is a Mott insulator exhibiting strong electron correlations. Films have been grown by pulsed laser deposition. Layer-by-layer growth and a phase-pure pervoskite lattice structure is observed, indicating good structural quality of the film and the interface. An electron-rich layer is found near the interface on the LaVO3 side for conducting LaVO3/SrTiO3. This could be explained by an electronic reconstruction within the film. The electrostatic doping results in a band-filling-controlled metal-insulator transition without suffering from chemical impurities, which is unavoidable in conventional doping experiments.