The exchange bias (EB) effect plays an undisputed role in the development of highly sensitive, robust, and high-density spintronic devices in magnetic data storage. However, the weak EB field, low blocking temperature, as well as the lack of modulation methods, seriously limit the application of EB in van der Waals (vdW) spintronic devices. Here, we utilized pressure engineering to tune the vdW spacing of the two-dimensional (2D) FePSe3/Fe3GeTe2 heterostructures. The EB field (HEB, from 29.2 mT to 111.2 mT) and blocking temperature (Tb, from 20 K to 110 K) are significantly enhanced, and a highly sensitive and robust spin valve is demonstrated. Interestingly, this enhancement of the EB effect was extended to exposed Fe3GeTe2, due to the single-domain nature of Fe3GeTe2. Our findings provide opportunities for the producing, exploring, and tuning of magnetic vdW heterostructures with strong interlayer coupling, thereby enabling customized 2D spintronic devices in the future.
The development of novel materials has challenges besides their synthesis. Materials such as novel MXenes are difficult to probe experimentally due to their reduced size and low stability under ambient conditions. Quantum mechanics and molecular dynamics simulations have been valuable options for material properties determination. However, computational materials scientists may still have difficulty finding specific force field models for their simulations. Force fields are usually hard to parametrize, and their parameters’ determination is computationally expensive. We show the Lennard-Jones (2-body interactions) combined with the Axilrod-Teller (3-body interactions) parametrization process’ applicability for metals and new classes of materials (MXenes). Because this parametrization process is simple and computationally inexpensive, it allows users to predict materials’ behaviors under close-to-ambient conditions in molecular dynamics, independent of pre-existing potential files. Using the process described in this work, we have made the Ti2C parameters set available for the first time in a peer-reviewed work.
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