Longitudinal magnetoresistance of thin gold films deposited on mica arising from electron-surface scattering

Abstract

We report the measurement of the longitudinal magnetoresistance, performed on 4 thin gold films of different thickness evaporated onto preheated mica, where the signal can be univocally attributed to electron-surface scattering. The magnetoresistance exhibits a marked thickness dependence: at 4 K and 9 Tesla it is about 2.6% for the thinner (72 nm) film, and about 13.5% for the thicker (266 nm) film. The observed magnetoresistance is at variance with the predictions of the theory of longitudinal magnetoresistance of Way and Kao [Phys. Rev. B 5, 2039 (1972)].