Tuesday, February 5, 2013

1302.0708 (N. C. Plumb et al.)

Mixed dimensionality of confined conducting electrons tied to
ferroelectric surface distortion on an oxide
   [PDF]

N. C. Plumb, M. Salluzzo, E. Razzoli, M. Månsson, M. Falub, J. Krempasky, C. E. Matt, J. Chang, M. Schulte, J. Braun, H. Ebert, J. Minár, B. Delley, K. -J. Zhou, T. Schmitt, M. Shi, J. Mesot, L. Patthey, M. Radović
Conducting oxide interfaces have been the subject of intense research due to the technological promise and theoretical challenges they present. The recent discovery of a metallic surface state on SrTiO3 may open an alternate route to simplified low-dimensional oxide conductors and give new insights into interface phenomena, but its origin - particularly as it might relate to oxygen vacancies - has been unclear. Here we show that the surface state consists of non-bulklike 3D Fermi surface (FS) components coexisting with quasi-2D components. Like their more 2D counterparts, the size and character of the 3D components are fixed with respect to the preparation of the bulk sample. Moreoever, while it is possible to trigger the metallicity by irradiating the sample surface, the spectroscopic signatures of this electronic reconstruction do not scale with any changes in stoichiometry. The results suggest that the distribution and electronic structure of carriers in the surface region are directly linked to the electrostatic conditions that support a ferroelectric surface distortion. The concept of such a "displacement state" is potentially relevant for a broad class of materials and heterostructures that are close to ferroelectric instabilities at their surfaces or interfaces.
View original: http://arxiv.org/abs/1302.0708

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