The VCoNi alloy is a face-centered cubic medium-entropy alloy with exceptionally high yield strength, serving as a prototypical system for investigating short-range order and phase stability in compositionally complex alloys. However, density functional theory calculations underestimate the stability of the random solid solution by several hundred Kelvin. To resolve this discrepancy, we present accurate Gibbs energy calculations for both the random solid solution and a prototypical $\mathrm{L}{1}_2$ ordered phase. Our findings reveal that vibrational and electronic excitations account for nearly half of the entropy difference between the ordered phase and disordered solid solution. These factors reduce the energy difference between the two phases by about one-third and help stabilize the solid solution. Our thermodynamic analysis is validated through direct comparison with experimental thermodynamic data.

We demonstrate a thermally activated epitaxy window for the growth of NbO at temperatures exceeding 1000 ${}^{\circ }\mathrm{C}$. NbO films grown in this mode display superior structural and transport properties, which are reproducible across a window of oxygen partial pressure. Through comprehensive analysis, we propose the prototypical electrical properties of NbO. This study unequivocally demonstrates the utility of high temperatures in the thin film synthesis of refractory metal compounds.

Discovery of two-dimensional ferromagnetic van der Waals chromium triiodide (${\mathrm{CrI}}_3$) opens new avenues toward tunable terahertz topological magnon via stacking order control in a multilayer system. We theoretically simulated magnetism and topological magnon modulation in multiple ${\mathrm{CrI}}_3/\mathrm{As}$ stacking orders by means of first-principles and linear spin-wave theory calculations. The first-nearest-neighbor spin-exchange interactions are enhanced up to 100% from those in monolayer ${\mathrm{CrI}}_3$ due to degeneracy lifting in $\mathrm{Cr} d$ orbitals induced by broken symmetry from the addition of $\mathrm{As}$ monolayer. Furthermore, interfacial charge transfer from the $\mathrm{As}$ monolayer to $\mathrm{I}$ atom in the bottom sublayer induces finite Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interactions of first-nearest-neighboring $\mathrm{Cr}$ atoms and enhances those of second-nearest-neighboring $\mathrm{Cr}$ atoms. Magnon Dirac gaps in bilayer ${\mathrm{CrI}}_3/\mathrm{As}$ are open wider than those in monolayer ${\mathrm{CrI}}_3$ at the edge of the Brillouin zone, attributed to the enhanced second-nearest-neighbor Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interactions. The magnon dispersion in a nanoribbon geometry exhibits localized magnon edge states, and the existence of localized edge states is unique to a certain periodicity direction relative to the crystallographic direction in the stacking order with broken rotational symmetry.

Predicting the failure and plasticity of solids remains a longstanding challenge, with broad implications for materials design and functional reliability. Disordered solids like metallic glasses can fail either abruptly or gradually without clear precursors, and the mechanical response depends strongly on composition, thermal history, and deformation protocol—impeding generalizable modeling. While deep learning methods offer predictive power, they often rely on numerous input parameters, hindering interpretability, methodology advancement, and practical deployment. We address this longstanding challenge with a macroscopic, physically grounded approach that uses plastic strain accumulation in the elastic regime to robustly predict deformation and yield. This method reduces complexity and improves interpretability, offering a practical alternative for disordered materials. For the Cu-Zr-(Al) metallic glasses prepared with varied annealing, we identify two limiting regimes of plastic strain growth: power law in poorly annealed and exponential in well-annealed samples. A physics-informed framework with Bayesian inference extracts growth parameters from stress-strain data within $\sim 5\%$ strain, enabling early prediction of bulk response and yield point, well before the failure. The predictive performance improves with annealing and bulk plasticity correlates with the microscopic plastic activity from scattered to growth near yielding. This work presents a physically interpretable and experimentally relevant framework for predicting plasticity, stress-strain curve, and failure in metallic glasses from early mechanical response, offering both theoretical insights and practical tools for material characterization and design.

Nitrogen vacancy (NV) centers in proximity of diamond surfaces are promising nanoscale quantum sensors. However, their coherence properties are negatively affected by magnetic and electric surface noise, whose origin and detailed impact have remained elusive. Using atomistic models of diamond surfaces derived with density functional theory, together with decoherence time calculations with cluster correlation expansion methods, we quantify the effects of surface crystallographic orientation and functionalization, and of the density of unpaired electrons on the NV Hahn-echo time ($T_2$). We determine a crossover depth at which $T_2$ ceases to be limited by surface-nuclear spins and recovers the bulk-limited value. We find that for static surface-electron baths, the ratio between the NV depth and the separation between surface electron spins determines a transition from fast-fluctuating to quasi-static noise, leading to a dependence of $T_2$ on orientation for specific surfaces. We also find that the modulation of $T_2$ by spin-phonon relaxations lead to motional‐narrowing at sub-microseconds relaxation times. Importantly, our calculations show that it is only when accounting for the surface spin in-sequence hopping that measured $T_2$ values as a function of depth can be reproduced, thus highlighting the importance of hopping-mediated models to describe the surface spin noise affecting NV sensors. Overall, our work provides clear guidelines for engineering diamond surfaces to achieve enhanced NV coherence for quantum sensing and information processing applications.

Spontaneous formation of a topological spin texture at room temperature under zero magnetic field is vital for advanced spintronics applications. One of the commonly used techniques for probing the formation of such a topological spin texture is the topological Hall effect (THE), which is usually induced by the fictitious field generated by a topological spin texture under a finite magnetic field. Here we report observation of THE under zero magnetic field in a van der Waals magnetic semimetal, $\mathrm{C}{\mathrm{r}}_3\mathrm{T}{\mathrm{e}}_4$. Owing to its high Curie temperature, spontaneous THE survives up to room temperature. Given the easy-plane anisotropy and centrosymmetric nature of $\mathrm{C}{\mathrm{r}}_3\mathrm{T}{\mathrm{e}}_4$, the observed THE signals should be induced by the formation of a magnetic bimeron stabilized by spin frustration. Our findings provide profound insights into the emergence of a topological spin texture in a centrosymmetric van der Waals magnet, taking a big step toward future ultracompact spintronics applications.

The room-temperature optical properties and the influence of light on the magnetic spin dynamics of ${\mathrm{EuZn}}_2{\mathrm{P}}_2$ are studied. Temperature-dependent electron spin resonance (ESR) measurements reveal that spin-spin interactions predominantly govern the spin relaxation mechanisms, as evidenced by the linewidth behavior ($\mathrm{\Delta }H$), whereas positive $g$ shifts ($\mathrm{\Delta }g)$ for $H\parallel ab$ indicate the presence of local electron polarization. The ESR data support the formation of anisotropic magnetic polarons, which trap spin carriers and contribute to increased electrical resistance. Angular-dependent ESR spectra at room temperature display anisotropic behavior in both $\mathrm{\Delta }g\left(\varphi \right)$ and $\mathrm{\Delta }H\left(\varphi \right)$, with a dominant three-dimensional component $C_{3\mathrm{D}}$, indicative of robust interlayer coupling and antiferromagnetic fluctuations. Under the influence of visible light, subtle linewidth broadening and enhanced ESR intensity indicate that photoexcited carriers influence the magnetic relaxation, suggesting a light-induced magnetic response possibly associated with a photomagnetic effect. Electrical transport measurements demonstrate a reproducible photovoltaic effect with a responsivity of $3.78\times {10}^{-3}$ A/W and detectivity of ${10}^{11}$ Jones, comparable to several known intermetallic and semiconductor photodetectors. These findings establish ${\mathrm{EuZn}}_2{\mathrm{P}}_2$ as an excellent platform among Zintl-type antiferromagnets to study the coupling between light matter and suggesting the presence of a possible photomagnetic effect.

Understanding the behavior and evolution of a dynamical many-body system by analyzing patterns in their experimentally captured images is a promising method relevant for a variety of living and nonliving self-assembled systems. The arrays of moving liquid crystal skyrmions studied here are a representative example of hierarchically organized materials that exhibit complex spatiotemporal dynamics driven by multiscale processes. Joint geometric and topological data analysis (TDA) offers a powerful framework for investigating such systems by capturing the underlying structure of the data at multiple scales. In the TDA approach, we introduce the $\mathrm{\Psi }$ function, a robust numerical topological descriptor related to both the spatiotemporal changes in the size and shape of individual topological solitons and the emergence of regions with their different spatial organization. The geometric method based on the analysis of vector fields generated from images of skyrmion ensembles offers insights into the nonlinear physical mechanisms of the system's response to external stimuli and provides a basis for comparison with theoretical predictions. The methodology presented here is very general and can provide a characterization of system behavior both at the level of individual pattern-forming agents and as a whole, allowing one to relate the results of image data analysis to processes occurring in a physical, chemical, or biological system in the real world.

Orbital currents induced by electric fields in transition metals have been experimentally reported in various material systems to date, in the form of orbital torques and orbital accumulation. However, most of these studies have been conducted on polycrystalline systems, and there has been virtually no discussion on their relation to first-principles electronic band structure calculations. In this study, we investigated the orbital Hall effect using epitaxial thin films of Ti, a 3d transition metal in which the spin Hall effect is negligibly small and the orbital Hall effect is dominant. Our first-principles calculations revealed that, within the $\mathrm{Ti}\left(1\overline{1}00\right)$ plane, the magnitude of the orbital Hall conductivity differs depending on whether the electric field is applied along the $\left[0001\right]$ or $\left[11\overline{2}0\right]$ direction. Based on this, we fabricated epitaxial $\mathrm{Ti}\left(1\overline{1}00\right)$ films and detected orbital torque using Ni, which has negligible magnetocrystalline anisotropy. As a result, we observed a clear anisotropy in the orbital torque generation efficiency depending on the direction of the applied electric field, consistent with the calculations. Furthermore, when using this orbital torque to reverse the magnetization of Ni, we found that the critical current density required for magnetization switching also varied according to the magnitude of the orbital torque generation efficiency. In this way, our study discusses the anisotropy of the orbital Hall effect in epitaxial transition metals with an aspect not observed in previously reported polycrystalline systems and offers a new direction in research on the orbital Hall effect.

Grain boundaries are critical for determining the functionality of polycrystalline materials. Here we investigate and present the structural and transport properties of grain boundaries in the unconventional superconductor ${\mathrm{CeCoIn}}_5$. We provide a detailed recipe for the fabrication of isolated grain-boundary devices from as-grown polycrystalline samples of ${\mathrm{CeCoIn}}_5$. Electron backscattered diffraction imaging of polycrystalline ${\mathrm{CeCoIn}}_5$ samples reveals an abundance of ${90}^{\circ }$ misorientation grain boundaries, suggesting a preferential nucleation of ${\mathrm{CeCoIn}}_5$ grains with ${90}^{\circ }$ misorientation over a random distribution of grain orientations. Transport measurements across grain-boundary devices establish coherence of superconductivity and allow us to establish a lower bound on the critical current density for the grain boundaries. Our work opens possibilities for fabrication of quantum devices such as Josephson junctions out of bulk unconventional superconducting materials.

We successfully synthesized single crystals of a series of C15b Laves-phase compounds, $R{\mathrm{InCo}}_4$ ($R=\mathrm{Dy}–\mathrm{Tm}$), with Co-pyrochlore and $R$-fcc sublattices, and systematically studied their magnetic properties via magnetometry measurements. These itinerant cubic compounds, with Curie temperatures above room temperature, show compensated ferrimagnetism featuring an antiferromagnetic coupling between the two sublattices. From this series, ${\mathrm{DyInCo}}_4$ exhibits the highest $T_{\mathrm{C}}(=368\mathrm{K}$) and a near-room-temperature compensation point $T_{\mathrm{cp}}(=295\mathrm{K}$). $T_{\mathrm{C}}$ does not change drastically with the $R$ atom, whereas $T_{\mathrm{cp}}$ is dependent. Another magnetization anomaly is observed in all the compounds at low temperatures, which may be indicative of changes in the lattice or magnetic structure. The easy axis of the ferrimagnetic moment of ${\mathrm{DyInCo}}_4, {\mathrm{ErInCo}}_4$, and ${\mathrm{TmInCo}}_4$ is proposed at $T=5\mathrm{K}$ to be along the [001], [111], and [110] directions, respectively. However, the simple easy-axis or easy-plane ferrimagnetic picture cannot be applied to ${\mathrm{HoInCo}}_4$. These observations suggest that the $R$ sublattice determines magnetic anisotropy and compensation, while the Co sublattice plays a role in strong magnetic ordering. The high Curie temperature, together with the magnetization compensation point near room temperature, renders these itinerant pyrochlore magnets interesting for spintronic applications.

Interface migration governs microstructural evolution during phase transformations and grain growth, thereby dictating those material properties that depend on microstructure. Recent work continues to highlight the rich range of behaviors exhibited by migrating interfaces, and the complex connection between these behaviors and the underlying atomistic processes that determine coarse-grained interfacial mobility. For interfaces moving at low homologous temperatures and small driving forces, we show that significant non-Markovian effects can arise that invalidate commonly used analysis methods. Specifically, we demonstrate that solute can act as a source of such non-Markovian motion. In turn, we introduce a time-local or time convolutionless propagator approach to account for memory-dominated short and intermediate time interface dynamics. This approach extrapolates to the long-time diffusive limit, enabling robust mobility estimates from molecular simulation time windows far shorter than those required to directly observe linear mean-square displacement scaling. Comparison with solute-free boundaries validates the method and quantifies solute drag in the Cahn-Hillert sense, providing a route to extract drag coefficients and effective mobilities across a range of solute concentrations. Our results demonstrate that analysis including memory is essential for connecting atomistic simulations to continuum models and offer a practical framework for studying interface kinetics in systems with slow internal processes.

Dirac fermions in condensed matter provide a versatile platform for exploring novel electronic phenomena and fundamental physics principles. Following the discovery of graphene, it was observed that certain layered materials can host planar square nets of atoms within their lattice, featuring a two-atom basis and supporting large-bandwidth Dirac bands. To date, several families of square net materials have been identified, exhibiting Dirac semimetal or nodal-line phases that host a diverse range of electronic and magnetic quantum properties. Here, we introduce a new class of square net semimetals: the binary rare-earth diantimonide compounds. Using angle-resolved photoemission spectroscopy and density functional theory calculations on the series precursor, ${\mathrm{LaSb}}_2$, we investigate the relationship between crystal structure and electronic topology. Our results reveal that the distinctive staggered symmetry of the square net layers induces a split double nodal-line structure in the low-energy dispersion. Furthermore, we predict that this splitting of the bands is accompanied by a Rashba-2 effect, establishing the rare-earth diantimonides as a compelling platform for studying Dirac spin-transport phenomena.

Magnetic materials are of great interest for investigating spin-dependent transport properties by analysis of the anomalous Hall effect (AHE) and topological Hall effect (THE). Here we report the concurrence of large AHE and THE over a wide temperature range up to room temperature in centrosymmetric ${\mathrm{Mn}}_5{\mathrm{Ge}}_3$. Unlike previous observation of AHE in ferromagnet, only the ordinary Hall effect captured by the two-band model is observed at low temperatures without AHE, which may be attributed to the opposite contribution from intrinsic and skew-scattering mechanisms. Remarkably, our results reveal two distinct sources of THE: noncollinear spin textures and skyrmion bubbles. When ${\mu }_{0}H$ ‖ $\left[100\right]$, a large THE is observed as a result of the chiral effect caused by the spin-flop process. A giant THE can also be detected when ${\mu }_{0}H$ ‖ $\left[001\right]$, which is mainly triggered by the skyrmion bubbles observed by magnetic force microscopy. Moreover, we find the topological Hall resistivity as high as 0.93 $\mu \mathrm{\Omega }\mathrm{cm}$ at 290 K, highlighting ${\mathrm{Mn}}_5{\mathrm{Ge}}_3$ as a promising candidate for future device applications.

Optimizing the band gap of ferroelectric oxides is crucial for enhancing light absorption in specific spectral ranges. In thin-film heterostructures, however, light absorption is also strongly influenced by interfacial properties. Bismuth ferrite–chromite (BFCO) thin films for instance, behave as a p-type semiconductor due to intrinsic cationic bismuth vacancies. When epitaxially grown on niobium-doped ${\mathrm{SrTiO}}_3$, a p-n-like junction forms with a characteristic depletion region. In this work, we present a nondestructive approach to determine the depletion region width using surface photovoltage (SPV) measurements. Kelvin probe force microscopy under illumination was applied to BFCO films of varying thicknesses. A distinct transition in the SPV response at $67\pm 5\mathrm{nm}$ identifies the depletion region width and the extent of band bending. These results are corroborated by macroscopic SPV measurements with a Kelvin probe setup. From the depletion width, the acceptor concentration in BFCO, primarily attributed to bismuth vacancies, was estimated to be $\sim 0.01\%$ of the total number of Bi atoms in the ideal lattice. This method provides a powerful and noninvasive route to probe depletion widths and carrier concentrations in complex ferroelectric heterostructures.

We investigate the effect of confinement on the magnetic state of a $12\text{−}\mathrm{n}\mathrm{m}$-thick ${\mathrm{Fe}}_5{\mathrm{GeTe}}_2$ layer grown by molecular beam epitaxy. We use quantitative scanning nitrogen-vacancy magnetometry to locally extract the magnetization in rectangular uniformly in-plane magnetized microstructures, showing no enhancement of the Curie temperature compared to magnetization measurements performed before patterning the film, in contrast to previous results obtained on thick ${\mathrm{Fe}}_3{\mathrm{GeTe}}_2$ flakes. Under the application of a weak out-of-plane magnetic field, we observe the stabilization of magnetic vortices at room temperature in micrometric squares. Finally, we highlight the effect of the size of the patterned microdisks and microsquares on the stabilization of the vortices using experiments and micromagnetic simulations. Our work thus proposes and demonstrates a way to stabilize noncollinear textures at room temperature in a van der Waals magnet using confinement.

We present a comprehensive study of the anisotropic magnetoresistance (AMR) in single-crystal $\mathrm{F}{\mathrm{e}}_{1-x}\mathrm{N}{\mathrm{i}}_x\left(001\right)$ alloy films with body-centered-cubic (bcc) structures, revealing a giant current-direction dependence and significant temperature-dependent behavior. In $\mathrm{F}{\mathrm{e}}_{0.8}\mathrm{N}{\mathrm{i}}_{0.2}$, the ratio between the AMR values for current along the [100] and [110] directions reaches 87 at 5 K. This ratio exhibits a strong temperature dependence, increasing nearly an order of magnitude as the temperature decreases from 300 K to 5 K. Additionally, we identify ultralow Gilbert damping ($\alpha \sim 2.3\times {10}^{-3}$) with negligible dependence on the magnetization orientation. The intrinsic anomalous Hall conductivity is found to decrease monotonically with Ni concentration. These results not only advance our understanding of FeNi alloys but also provide valuable insights for developing materials with customized magnetoresistance and low damping for magnetic sensing and data storage applications.

We explore the interrelation between crystal structure, magnetism, and magnetodielectric behavior in the spin-cluster compound ${\mathrm{Ba}}_6{\mathrm{Nd}}_2{\mathrm{Fe}}_4{\mathrm{O}}_{15}$. Magnetization measurements indicate the emergence of long-range antiferromagnetic order at $T_{\mathrm{N}}\approx 16\mathrm{K}$, supported by corresponding anomalies in the specific heat. Magnetic isotherms display a field-induced spin-flop transition at critical fields ${\mu }_0{H}_{\mathrm{C}1}$ and ${\mu }_0{H}_{\mathrm{C}2}$. Field-dependent neutron diffraction uncovers an antiferromagnetic ground state characterized by the propagation vector ${\mathit{k}}_1=(1/2,0,0)$ for fields ${\mu }_{0}H<0.6\mathrm{T}$, which transitions to a ferrimagnetic state with ${\mathit{k}}_2=(0,0,0)$ for ${\mu }_{0}H>1.2\mathrm{T}$. In the intermediate field range ($0.6\mathrm{T}<{\mu }_{0}H<1.2\mathrm{T}$), both magnetic vectors exist. Dielectric measurements exhibit a distinct anomaly near $T_{\mathrm{N}}$, alongside a robust magnetodielectric response that persists well above the transition, indicating strong coupling between the Fe tetramer spin clusters and dipolar degrees of freedom. The resulting ${\mu }_{0}H\text{–}T$ phase diagram delineates three magnetic regimes, distinguished by shifts in propagation vectors and corresponding variations in magnetization, thermal, and dielectric properties. Furthermore, temperature-dependent synchrotron x-ray diffraction suggests a subtle magnetostrictive effect near the ordering temperature. These findings highlight the intricate magnetodielectric effect in ${\mathrm{Ba}}_6{\mathrm{Nd}}_2{\mathrm{Fe}}_4{\mathrm{O}}_{15}$ and position it as a promising candidate for magnetodielectric applications.

Ferromagnetic pyrochlore and spinel materials with topological flat bands are of interest for their potential to exhibit a giant anomalous Hall effect (AHE). In this work, we present computational predictions of stability and electronic structure for 448 compositions within the pyrochlore ($A_2{B}_2{\mathrm{O}}_7$) and spinel ($A{B}_2{\mathrm{O}}_4$) frameworks. Of these, 92 are predicted to be thermodynamically stable or close (<100 meV/atom) to the convex hull, with trends deviating from expectations based on ionic radius-ratio rules. Thirteen are predicted to adopt a ferromagnetic ground state among the collinear configurations considered. Two additional materials meeting these criteria were also identified from open materials databases. Calculations of anomalous Hall angles (AHA) and conductivities reveal that 11 of the screened materials are promising candidates for spintronic applications requiring high electronic conductivity and a giant AHE. Our results suggest that the AHA can be further enhanced by tuning the Fermi level, for example, through chemical doping. Using this approach, we identify five materials whose AHA exceed 0.2 under the approximation of collinear magnetism. Notably, $\mathrm{A}{\mathrm{g}}_2\mathrm{P}{\mathrm{t}}_2{\mathrm{O}}_7$ exhibits a high AHA of 0.405 when its Fermi level is optimized. These findings provide a roadmap for the targeted synthesis of new pyrochlore and spinel compounds with enhanced AHE properties. They also broaden the compositional design space for these structures and support the discovery of high-performance materials for next-generation spintronic applications.

Nondestructive identification of deformation mechanisms at the microscopic scale is a significant challenge, yet it holds the potential to advance the understanding of damage evolution across many areas of materials mechanics. In this study, we combine spectral analysis of acoustic emission (AE) waveforms with dimensionality reduction to cluster individual AE events occurring during the deformation of a magnesium single crystal. Based on prior knowledge, according to which twinning is preferred at low stresses and slip is expected to become dominant when twinning is exhausted, we link these clusters to their related deformation mechanisms. This enables unsupervised classification of each AE event into the two deformation mechanisms. Furthermore, based on resonance ultrasound spectroscopy and modal calculations, we identify a frequency signature in AE signals, corresponding to one of the sample's resonant modes, and we associate it with slip. This allows us to define a single traceable, physically based classification parameter that performs comparably to the machine learning–based clustering. The results of both classification methods are consistent with each other and align with the expected deformation behavior and the shape of the loading curve. At the same time, they reveal detailed quantitative information at the level of individual AE events, which uncovers the evolution of the transition from twinning-dominant to slip-dominant behavior.