Examining the Spin Structure of Altermagnetic Candidate MnTe Grown with Near Ideal Stoichiometry

Altermagnets are a recently discovered class of materials with magnetic ordering that have a zero net magnetization and a momentum-dependent spin splitting in their band structure, arising from a collinear spin arrangement with alternating polarizations in the crystal lattice. The nickeline-structured manganese telluride (α-MnTe) is an attractive altermagnet candidate due to its predicted large spin splitting energy and a transition temperature near 300 K. In this work, we present a thorough investigation of the spin structure of α-MnTe thin films grown by molecular beam epitaxy with very high crystal quality and low residual magnetization. The epitaxial α-MnTe films have a full-width-at-half-maximum of 0.1° as measured by X-ray-diffraction rocking curves and a root-mean-square roughness below 1 nm. Neutron diffraction measurements confirm the antiferromagnetic order in the α-MnTe film and show a Néel temperature of 307 K. Polarized neutron reflectometry detects a vanishingly small net magnetization which may be confined to the MnTe/InP interface, which is evidence of the near-ideal stoichiometry in the sample. In vacuo angle resolved photoemission spectroscopy reveals that the bulk band spectrum of the MnTe films is consistent with the weak altermagnetic order as theoretically predicted and observed for the high symmetry nodal plane in the center of the Brillouin zone. This study establishes optimized growth conditions for the synthesis of stoichiometric α-MnTe thin films which exhibit exceptional structural and magnetic ordering, thereby providing a robust platform for evaluating the properties relevant to its consideration as an altermagnetic candidate.