Unprecedented look at oxide interfaces reveals unexpected structures on atomic scale
07 Aug 2010
Thin layers of oxide materials and their interfaces have been observed in atomic resolution during growth for the first time by researchers at the Centre for Nanophase Materials Sciences at the Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory, providing new insight into the complicated link between their structure and properties.
 |
| A new scanning tunneling microscopy and low energy electron diffraction technique developed at Oak Ridge National Laboratory captured this 50 nm x 50 nm image of an oxide surface. Each bright dot is a single atom of material. |
"Imagine you suddenly had the ability to see in colour, or in 3-D," said the CNMS's Sergei Kalinin. "That is how close we have been able to look at these very small interfaces."
The paper was published online in ACS Nano with ORNL's Junsoo Shin as lead author.
A component of magnetoelectronics and spintronics, oxide interfaces have the potential to replace silicon-based microelectronic devices and improve the power and memory retention of other electronic technologies.
However, oxide interfaces are difficult to analyze at the atomic scale because once the oxides are removed from their growth chamber they become contaminated.
To circumvent this problem, ORNL researchers led by Art Baddorf built a unique system that allows scanning tunneling microscopy and low energy electron diffraction to capture images of the top layer of the oxide while in situ, or still in the vacuum chamber where the materials were grown by powerful laser pulses.
