High temperature superconductivity at FeSe/LaFeO<sub>3</sub> interface.

Song, Yuanhe; Chen, Zheng; Zhang, Qinghua; Xu, Haichao; Lou, Xia; Chen, Xiaoyang; Xu, Xiaofeng; Zhu, Xuetao et al. · Nat Commun · 2021

basic_science · Level V

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Abstract

Enormous enhancement of superconducting pairing temperature (T<sub>g</sub>) to 65 K in FeSe/SrTiO<sub>3</sub> has made it a spotlight. Despite the effort of interfacial engineering, FeSe interfaced with TiO<sub>x</sub> remains the unique case in hosting high T<sub>g</sub>, hindering a decisive understanding on the general mechanism and ways to further improving T<sub>g</sub>. Here we constructed a new high-T<sub>g</sub> interface, single-layer FeSe interfaced with FeO<sub>x</sub>-terminated LaFeO<sub>3</sub>. Large superconducting gap and diamagnetic response evidence that the superconducting pairing can emerge near 80 K, highest amongst all-known interfacial superconductors. Combining various techniques, we reveal interfacial charge transfer and strong interfacial electron-phonon coupling (EPC) in FeSe/LaFeO<sub>3</sub>, showing that the cooperative pairing mechanism works beyond FeSe-TiO<sub>x</sub>. Intriguingly, the stronger interfacial EPC than that in FeSe/SrTiO<sub>3</sub> is likely induced by the stronger interfacial bonding in FeSe/LaFeO<sub>3</sub>, and can explain the higher T<sub>g</sub> according to recent theoretical calculations, pointing out a workable route in designing new interfaces to achieve higher T<sub>g</sub>.