Spin-polarized scanning tunneling microscopy of half-metallic ferromagnets: Nonquasiparticle contributions

Abstract

The role of the many-body (spin-polaronic) effects in the scanning tunneling spectroscopy of half-metallic ferromagnets (HMF) is considered. It is shown that the non-quasiparticle (NQP) states exist in the majority or minority spin gap in the presence of arbitrary external potential and, in particular, at the surfaces and interfaces. Energy dependence of the NQP density of states is obtained in various models of HMF, an important role of the hybridization nature of the energy gap being demonstrated. The corresponding temperature dependence of spin polarization is calculated. It is shown that the NQP states result in a sharp bias dependence of the tunneling conductance near zero bias. Asymmetry of the NQP states with respect to the Fermi energy provides an opportunity to separate phonon and magnon peaks in the inelastic spectroscopy by STM.