Magnetic tunnel junctions with monolayer hexagonal boron nitride tunnel barriers

By Maëlis Piquemal-Banci, R. Galceran, Sabina Caneva, Marie‐Blandine Martin, R. Weatherup, P. Kidambi, K. Bouzehouane, S. Xavier, A. Anane, F. Petroff and 5 more. 2016

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We report on the integration of atomically thin 2D insulating hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) tunnel barriers into Co/h-BN/Fe magnetic tunnel junctions(MTJs). The h-BN monolayer is directly grown by chemical vapor deposition on Fe. The Conductive Tip Atomic Force Microscopy (CT-AFM) measurements reveal the homogeneity of the tunnel behavior of our h-BN layers. As expected for tunneling, the resistance depends exponentially on the number of h-BN layers. The h-BN monolayer properties are also characterized through integration into complete MTJ devices. A Tunnel Magnetoresistance of up to 6% is observed for a MTJ based on a single atomically thin h-BN layer.

Subfields: Atomic and Molecular Physics, and Optics, Materials Chemistry

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/69d6ef9674ecd0fb87385c58748ae21c82c53d36