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arXiv · 1402.3069

Trend of the magnetic anisotropy for individual Mn dopants near the (110) GaAs surface

M R Mahani·A Pertsova·C M Canali
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Abstract

Using a microscopic finite-cluster tight-binding model, we investigate the trend of the magnetic anisotropy energy as a function of the cluster size for an individual Mn impurity positioned in the vicinity of the (110) GaAs surface,We present results of calculations for large cluster sizes, containing approximately 104 atoms, which have not been investigated so far. Our calculations demonstrate that the anisotropy energy of a Mn dopant in bulk GaAs found to be non-zero in previous tight-binding calculations, is purely a finite size effect, and it vanishes as the inverse cluster size. In contrast to this, we find that the splitting of the three in-gap Mn acceptor energy levels converges to a finite value in the limit of infinite cluster size. For a Mn in bulk GaAs this feature is related to the nature of the mean-field treatment of the coupling between the impurity and its nearest neighbors atoms. Moreover, we calculate the trend of the anisotropy energy in the sublayers, as the Mn dopant is moved away from the surface towards the center of the cluster. Here the use of large cluster sizes allows us to position the impurity in deeper sublayers below the surface, compared to previous calculations. In particular, we show that the anisotropy energy increases up to the fifth sublayer and then decreases as the impurity is moved further away from the surface, approaching its bulk value. The present study provides important insight for experimental control and manipulation of the electronic and magnetic properties of individual Mn dopants at the semiconductor surface by means of advanced scanning tunneling microscopy techniques.

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M R Mahani, A Pertsova, C M Canali. 2014-04-16. Trend of the magnetic anisotropy for individual Mn dopants near the (110) GaAs surface. https://doi.org/10.1088/0953-8984%2F26%2F39%2F394006

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