Tailoring of defects dependent magnetic properties of swift heavy ion irradiated CeO2 for spintronics application

The present investigation reports the swift heavy ion induced effects on cerium oxide (CeO2) thin films. These thin films were deposited on Si (111) substrates by the electron-beam evaporation method and irradiated by a 100 MeV O7+ ion beam with different ion fluences. X-ray diffraction analysis of these films confirms the stable fluorite phase of CeO2 even after the higher fluence of irradiations. Raman measurement also supports the presence of the F-2g phase of CeO2 and the presence of defect states. The Gaussian deconvolution of photoluminescence (PL) spectra reveals various defect-associated peaks. The broad peaks in the PL spectra are associated with oxygen vacancies and are red-shifted (494-520 nm) with ion fluences. The surface morphological images show the modification in the surface roughness with ion irradiation and the re-growth of smaller circular-formed nanoparticles on the surface is observed at the fluence of 5 x 10(11) ions/cm(2). Magnetic measurements show an enhancement in magnetic ordering with ion irradiation. All the samples demonstrate room temperature ferromagnetism with magnetic saturation (M-s) up to 14.57 emu/cm(3). The saturation magnetization in irradiated thin films is directly correlated to the area under the peak of defect-associated PL emission. The mechanism such as the oxygen vacancy-based F-center exchange model is considered to understand the enhancement of ferromagnetism in ion irradiated CeO2 thin films. Some popular theoretical models are also employed to determine various magnetic parameters.