Enhancement of temperature of quantum anomalous Hall effect in two-dimensional germanene/magnetic semiconductor heterostructures

TL;DR

This paper investigates germanene/magnetic semiconductor heterostructures and demonstrates that tensile strain can significantly enhance the temperature at which the quantum anomalous Hall effect occurs, reaching up to 64 K.

Contribution

The study introduces a method to increase QAHE temperature in 2D germanene heterostructures using tensile strain, based on first-principles calculations and experimental data.

Findings

QAHE temperature up to 64 K achieved in strained heterostructures

Tensile strain decreases band gap but increases Curie temperature

Topologically nontrivial edge states confirmed in heterostructures

Abstract

Quantum anomalous Hall effect (QAHE) is significant for future low-power electronics devices, where a main challenge is realizing QAHE at high temperatures. In this work, based on experimentally reported two-dimensional (2D) germanene and magnetic semiconductors Cr$_2$Ge$_2$Te$_6$ and Cr$_2$Si$_2$Te$_6$, and the first principle calculations, germanene/magnetic semiconductor heterostructures are investigated. Topologically nontrivial edge states and quantized anomalous Hall conductance are demonstrated. It is shown that the QAHE temperature can be enhanced to approximately 62 K in germanene/monolayer (ML) Cr$_2$Ge$_2$Te$_6$ with 2.1\% tensile strain, 64 K in germanene/bilayer (BL) Cr$_2$Ge$_2$Te$_6$ with 1.4\% tensile strain, and 50 K in germanene/ML Cr$_2$Si$_2$Te$_6$ with 1.3\% tensile strain. With increasing tensile strain of these heterostructures, the band gap decreases and the Curie temperature rises, and the highest temperature of QAHE is obtained. Since these 2D materials were discovered in recent experiments, our results provide promising materials for achieving high-temperature QAHE.