Experimental Studies of Transport Properties of Novel Amorphous Fe-Dy-O Thin Films.

This work focuses on the transport properties of Fe-Dy oxides. The material is related to the recently discovered Fe-Tb-Dy oxides that show remarkable optical and galvanomagnetic properties with potential for electronics, photonics, and spintronics applications. By eliminating Tb, we hope to gain a better understanding of the individual ways the two lanthanides, Tb and Dy, affect the properties of the Fe-Tb-Dy oxides. In addition, Fe-Dy-O, the material that has not been studied yet, may exhibit interesting properties and potential for applications on its own.

Fe-Dy-O films were grown by the ion beam evaporation on different substrates. The amorphous nature of the films was confirmed by the EBSD. The chemical composition of the films was studied by the EDS. Galvanomagnetic measurements were performed in the Van-der Pauw geometry in the temperature range between 6K and 700K. Then samples were repeatedly heated from 300K to 700K in the low vacuum environment, while resistivity and Hall Effect were monitored in-situ. We will discuss the effect of the initial annealing on the sample properties as well as the evolution of the transport properties of as-deposited samples as a result of the thermal cycling.