title: Room-temperature helimagnetism in FeGe thin films.
abstract: Chiral magnets are promising materials for the realisation of high-density and low-power spintronic memory devices. For these future applications, a key requirement is the synthesis of appropriate materials in the form of thin films ordering well above room temperature. Driven by the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction, the cubic compound FeGe exhibits helimagnetism with a relatively high transition temperature of 278 K in bulk crystals. We demonstrate that this temperature can be enhanced significantly in thin films. Using x-ray scattering and ferromagnetic resonance techniques, we provide unambiguous experimental evidence for long-wavelength helimagnetic order at room temperature and magnetic properties similar to the bulk material. We obtain αintr= 0.0036 ± 0.0003 at 310 K for the intrinsic damping parameter. We probe the dynamics of the system by means of muon-spin rotation, indicating that the ground state is reached via a freezing out of slow dynamics. Our work paves the way towards the fabrication of thin films of chiral magnets that host certain spin whirls, so-called skyrmions, at room temperature and potentially offer integrability into modern electronics.
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Clarendon Laboratory, University of Oxford, Oxford, OX1 3PU, UK.
authors.forename: S L
authors.initials: SL
authors.lastname: Zhang
authors.affiliation: Lehrstuhl für Physik funktionaler Schichtsysteme, Technische Universität München, Physik Department, D-85748, Garching, Germany.
authors.forename: I
authors.identifier: 0000-0003-4645-4254
authors.initials: I
authors.lastname: Stasinopoulos
authors.affiliation: Centre for Materials Physics, Durham University, Durham, DH1 3LE, UK.
authors.forename: T
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Lancaster
authors.affiliation: Centre for Materials Physics, Durham University, Durham, DH1 3LE, UK.
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Xiao
authors.affiliation: Lehrstuhl für Topologie korrelierter Systeme, Technische Universität München, Physik Department, D-85748, Garching, Germany.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Bauer
authors.affiliation: Lehrstuhl für Topologie korrelierter Systeme, Technische Universität München, Physik Department, D-85748, Garching, Germany.
authors.forename: F
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Rucker
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Clarendon Laboratory, University of Oxford, Oxford, OX1 3PU, UK.|Magnetic Spectroscopy Group, Diamond Light Source, Didcot, OX11 0DE, UK.
authors.forename: A A
authors.initials: AA
authors.lastname: Baker
authors.affiliation: Magnetic Spectroscopy Group, Diamond Light Source, Didcot, OX11 0DE, UK.
authors.forename: A I
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-8498-9383
authors.initials: AI
authors.lastname: Figueroa
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for Muon Spin Spectroscopy, Paul Scherrer Institut, CH-5232, Villigen, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Z
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-3431-8135
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Salman
authors.affiliation: ISIS Facility, STFC Rutherford Appleton Laboratory, Chilton, Didcot, Oxfordshire, OX11 0QX, UK.
authors.forename: F L
authors.initials: FL
authors.lastname: Pratt
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Clarendon Laboratory, University of Oxford, Oxford, OX1 3PU, UK.
authors.forename: S J
authors.initials: SJ
authors.lastname: Blundell
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for Muon Spin Spectroscopy, Paul Scherrer Institut, CH-5232, Villigen, Switzerland.
authors.forename: T
authors.identifier: 0000-0002-7643-4695
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Prokscha
authors.affiliation: Laboratory for Muon Spin Spectroscopy, Paul Scherrer Institut, CH-5232, Villigen, Switzerland.
authors.forename: A
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Suter
authors.affiliation: Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität zu Köln, 50937, Köln, Germany.
authors.forename: J
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Waizner
authors.affiliation: Institut für Theoretische Physik, Universität zu Köln, 50937, Köln, Germany.|Institut für Theoretische Physik, Technische Universität Dresden, 01062, Dresden, Germany.
authors.forename: M
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Garst
authors.affiliation: Lehrstuhl für Physik funktionaler Schichtsysteme, Technische Universität München, Physik Department, D-85748, Garching, Germany.|Institute of Materials and Laboratory of Nanoscale Magnetic Materials and Magnonics, School of Engineering, École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne, CH-1015, Lausanne, Switzerland.
authors.forename: D
authors.initials: D
authors.lastname: Grundler
authors.affiliation: Magnetic Spectroscopy Group, Diamond Light Source, Didcot, OX11 0DE, UK.
authors.forename: G
authors.identifier: 0000-0001-6852-2495
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: van der Laan
authors.affiliation: Lehrstuhl für Topologie korrelierter Systeme, Technische Universität München, Physik Department, D-85748, Garching, Germany.
authors.forename: C
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Pfleiderer
authors.affiliation: Department of Physics, Clarendon Laboratory, University of Oxford, Oxford, OX1 3PU, UK. Thorsten.Hesjedal@physics.ox.ac.uk.
authors.forename: T
authors.identifier: 0000-0001-7947-3692
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Hesjedal