UNA4CAREER
This project has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 Research and Innovation Programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement Nยบ 847635.
910797. Group of Physics of Complex Materials (GFMC)
Department of Materials Physics
Facultad de Ciencias Físicas
The candidate will be integrated in the structure of the host group (7 permanent researchers, 4 post docs and 4 PhD students. 2 PhD students will directly benefit from the close interaction with the candidate. Active synergies will be built with the newly started QuantERA project “QUANtum Technologies with 2D-Oxides” QUANTOX and FlagERA project “Towards 2D transferable oxide layers” TO2DOX. The candidate will benefit from the interaction with principal investigators of the international consortium allowing development of international networking valuable for his future career as an independent researcher. The host group has international recognition in the growth and characterization of oxide thin film heterostructures and devices (ferroelectric) perovskites, (colossal magnetoresistance) manganites, (high Tc superconducting) cuprates, Mott and band insulators, and solid electrolytes. Structures and devices are superlattices, magnetic tunnel junctions, and planar nanostrucutres for lateral transport fabricated by optical and e-beam lithography. The group is an Associated Unit (Unidad Asociada Laboratorio de heteroestructuras con aplicación en Espintrónica) to the 2D-Foundry group at ICMM- CSIC. The candidate will have unlimited access to its resources including contact microscopies (AFM, PFM, MFM, micro Raman), and techniques of placement of 2D materials.
3 high pressure oxygen sputtering systems installed in a clean room (ISO class 4). Nanofabrication clean room (ISO class 6) equipped with optical and electron beam lithography RAITH 50. He cryostat with a 10 T magnet and 2 closed cycle cryostats (7- 300 K) with electromagnets and 2 MONTANA cryostats (3 -350 K) , broad band frequency (10-6 Hz to 1 GHz) and dielectric spectroscopy (NOVOCONTROL. FMR ferromagnetic resonance set up from 1 to 25 GHz variable temperature (300 – 10 K) and magnetic field (up to 0.7 T). Radio frequency pulse (10 ns) resistive switching of magnetic tunnel junctions (from 300 to 3 K). Access to x-ray diffraction, Atomic Force Microscopy and STEM EELS aberration corrected Electron Microscopy.
Joint Research Unit with Institute of Materials Science (ICMM-CSIC) also in Madrid which adds magnetometry (VSM-PPMS, MPMS SQUID, torque), heat and thermal conductivity and contact microscopies AFM-PFM-MFM at variable temperature and under magnetic fields.
Freestanding 2D layers of correlated oxides. The project aims at fabricating and characterizing a new class of freestanding 2D layers based on correlated transition metal oxides, and their combination in multifunctional heterostructures with conventional 2D van der Waals (vdW) materials. 2D-oxide freestanding layers will harbor novel spontaneous and externally switchable collective states driven by electronic correlations which will tremendously expand the functional capabilities of current vdW materials. The new type of freestanding correlated oxide 2D layers will be synthesized from epitaxial ultrathin oxide layers grown on sacrificial layers with atomic level control of their chemistry and structure. 2D oxide layers will be transferred and manipulated using deterministic placement methods developed for 2D vdW materials. Heterostructures combining freestanding layers of correlated oxides with vdW 2D layers will inspire a completely new generation of proximity phenomena. These will be exploited to engineer electronic groundstates with tunable responses, absent in the current vdW materials including electrically controlled topological states, spin-orbit induced spin textures or topological superconductivity.
The project is committed to the study and realization of a novel technological platform based on the oxide nanotechnology for exploiting novel quantum states in correlated oxides. From the applied perspective, collective orders switchable by an external field could inspire new strategies for new device concepts towards future atto-Joule low voltage logic surpassing the (energy) limitations of the current CMOS semiconductor technology.
