Anomalous Hall effect in van der Waals bonded ferromagnet Fe$_{3-x}$GeTe$_2$

TL;DR

This study investigates the anomalous Hall effect in Fe$_{3-x}$GeTe$_2$, revealing intrinsic mechanisms dominate and identifying low-temperature deviations linked to magnetic disorder and Fermi surface changes.

Contribution

It provides the first detailed analysis of AHE in Fe$_{3-x}$GeTe$_2$, demonstrating intrinsic Karplus-Luttinger mechanism dominance and exploring temperature-dependent magnetic and electronic properties.

Findings

AHE in Fe$_{3-x}$GeTe$_2$ is dominated by intrinsic mechanisms.

A second magnetic transition occurs below 119 K.

Deviations at low temperatures suggest magnetic disorder effects.

Abstract

We report anomalous Hall effect (AHE) in single crystals of quasi-two-dimensional Fe$_{3-x}$GeTe$_2$ ($x \approx 0.36$) ferromagnet grown by the flux method which induces defects on Fe site and bad metallic resistivity. Fe K-edge x-ray absorption spectroscopy was measured to provide information on local atomic environment in such crystals. The dc and ac magnetic susceptibility measurements indicate a second-stage transition below 119 K in addition to the paramagnetic to ferromagnetic transition at 153 K. A linear scaling behavior between the modified anomalous Hall resistivity $\rho_{xy}/\mu_0H_{eff}$ and longitudinal resistivity $\rho_{xx}^2M/\mu_0H_{eff}$ implies that the AHE in Fe$_{3-x}$GeTe$_2$ should be dominated by the intrinsic Karplus-Luttinger mechanism rather than the extrinsic skew-scattering and side-jump mechanisms. The observed deviation in the linear-M Hall conductivity $\sigma_{xy}^A$ below 30 K is in line with its transport characteristic at low temperatures, implying the scattering of conduction electrons due to magnetic disorder and the evolution of the Fermi surface induced by possible spin-reorientation transition.