Coexistence of Superconductivity and Antiferromagnetism in Topological Magnet MnBi2Te4 Films

• Published in: Nano letters Vol. 24; no. 26; pp. 7962 - 7971
• Main Authors: Yuan, Wei, Yan, Zi-Jie, Yi, Hemian, Wang, Zihao, Paolini, Stephen, Zhao, Yi-Fan, Zhou, Lingjie, Wang, Annie G., Wang, Ke, Prokscha, Thomas, Salman, Zaher, Suter, Andreas, Balakrishnan, Purnima P., Grutter, Alexander J., Winter, Laurel E., Singleton, John, Chan, Moses H. W., Chang, Cui-Zu
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: American Chemical Society 03.07.2024
• Subjects: molecular beam epitaxy growth; antiferromagnetism; scanning tunneling microscopy/spectroscopy; interface-induced superconductivity; intrinsic magnetic topological insulator
• DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.4c01407
• ISSN: 1530-6984; 1530-6992

The interface of two materials can harbor unexpected emergent phenomena. One example is interface-induced superconductivity. In this work, we employ molecular beam epitaxy to grow a series of heterostructures formed by stacking together two nonsuperconducting antiferromagnetic materials, an intrinsic antiferromagnetic topological insulator MnBi2Te4 and an antiferromagnetic iron chalcogenide FeTe. Our electrical transport measurements reveal interface-induced superconductivity in these heterostructures. By performing scanning tunneling microscopy and spectroscopy measurements, we observe a proximity-induced superconducting gap on the top surface of the MnBi2Te4 layer, confirming the coexistence of superconductivity and antiferromagnetism in the MnBi2Te4 layer. Our findings will advance the fundamental inquiries into the topological superconducting phase in hybrid devices and provide a promising platform for the exploration of chiral Majorana physics in MnBi2Te4-based heterostructures.