Large coincidence lattice on Au/Fe3O4 incommensurate structure for spintronic applications

The design of metallic hybrid systems for spintronics has been widely studied during the past decade, motivated by the promising technological applications of these materials. Nevertheless, the importance of preserving the native structure and properties of the interfaces is often ignored. Here, we present the fabrication of nanocrystalline Au (0 0 1) onto a single oriented Fe3O4 (0 0 1) thin film as a promising hybrid system to develop spintronic devices by growing Au over the Fe3O4 by using a simple one-pot Pulsed Laser Deposition (PLD) approach. The structural coupling between Au nanocrystals and Fe3O4 layer results in the development of an incommensurate structure based on a coincidence lattice of order 35, which preserves the intrinsic properties of the Au nanocrystals, the Fe3O4 matrix and the interface between them. The general strategy described in the present work preserves the structure and main intrinsic properties of the constituting materials, being a fundamental issue for the future development of spintronic devices.