Low-temperature molecular beam epitaxy of a ferromagnetic full-Heusler alloy Fe2MnSi on Ge(111)

We demonstrate the epitaxial growth of ferromagnetic full-Heusler alloy Fe2MnSi layers on group-IV semiconductor Ge(111) using molecular beam epitaxy at the growth temperatures of 130 and 200 °C. The Fe2MnSi/Ge(111) layers have an atomic-scale abrupt interface and include the ordered L21 phase. We also show ferromagnetic features with a saturation magnetization of ∼2.2 μB/f.u. and a Curie temperature of ∼210 K, which are nearly comparable to those of bulk Fe2MnSi.