Magnetic properties of single atoms of Fe and Co on Ir(111) and Pt(111)

TL;DR

This study investigates the magnetic anisotropy of single Fe and Co atoms on Ir(111) and Pt(111) surfaces using relativistic computational methods, revealing substrate-dependent magnetic orientations and comparing results with experimental data.

Contribution

It applies fully relativistic embedded cluster and KKR methods to analyze single-atom magnetic properties on different substrates, providing new insights into their anisotropy behaviors.

Findings

Fe and Co adatoms are strongly perpendicularly oriented on Pt(111).

On Ir(111), Co is out-of-plane, Fe is in-plane.

Results align with recent spin-polarized STM experiments.

Abstract

In using the fully relativistic versions of the Embedded Cluster and Screened Korringa-Kohn-Rostoker methods for semi-infinite systems the magnetic properties of single adatoms of Fe and Co on Ir(111) and Pt(111) are studied. It is found that for Pt(111) Fe and Co adatoms are strongly perpendicularly oriented, while on Ir(111) the orientation of the magnetization is only out-of-plane for a Co adatom, for an Fe adatom it is in-plane. For comparison also the so-called band energy parts of the anisotropy energy of a single layer of Fe and Co on these two substrates are shown. The obtained results are compared to recent experimental studies using e.g. the spin-polarized STM technique.