Room temperature biaxial magnetic anisotropy in La0.67Sr0.33MnO3 thin films on SrTiO3 buffered MgO (001) substrates for spintronic applications

TL;DR

This study demonstrates that La0.67Sr0.33MnO3 thin films grown on SrTiO3 buffered MgO substrates exhibit stable room temperature biaxial magnetic anisotropy, which is crucial for spintronic device applications.

Contribution

The paper reveals the realization of room temperature biaxial magnetic anisotropy in LSMO thin films on specific substrates, avoiding uniaxial contributions for improved spintronic performance.

Findings

Room temperature biaxial magnetic anisotropy achieved in LSMO films.

Magnetocrystalline origin of the four-fold symmetry anisotropy.

Detailed analysis of magnetization reversal pathways and critical fields.

Abstract

Spintronics exploits the magnetoresistance effects to store or sense the magnetic information. Since the magnetoresistance strictly depends on the magnetic anisotropy of the system, it is fundamental to set a defined anisotropy to the system. Here, we investigate by means of vectorial Magneto-Optical Kerr Magnetometry (v-MOKE), half-metallic La0.67Sr0.33MnO3 (LSMO) thin films that exhibit at room temperature pure biaxial magnetic anisotropy if grown onto MgO (001) substrate with a thin SrTiO3 (STO) buffer. In this way, we can avoid unwanted uniaxial magnetic anisotropy contributions that may be detrimental for specific applications. The detailed study of the angular evolution of the magnetization reversal pathways, critical fields (coercivity and switching) allows for disclosing the origin of the magnetic anisotropy, which is magnetocrystalline in nature and shows four-fold symmetry at any temperature.