Large interfacial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction of epitaxial perovskite La_0.7Sr_0.3MnO₃ films

The Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI) is pivotal in stabilizing topological spin textures, a critical aspect of the rapidly advancing field of oxide-based spintronics. While skyrmions and the topological Hall effect have been widely studied in oxide films, experimental verification of interfacial DMI and its underlying mechanisms in oxide interfaces has remained largely unexplored. In this study, we report a significantly large interfacial DMI in La_0.7Sr_0.3MnO₃ (LSMO) films grown on NdGaO₃ substrates, with a DMI coefficient of 1.96 pJ/m—one to two orders of magnitude higher than previously observed in oxide systems. Our experiments, coupled with first-principles calculations, reveal that enhanced spin-orbit coupling at the LSMO/NdGaO₃ interface, driven by a synergy between the 6s electrons of Nd and the 4f electrons, is the key to this large DMI. This breakthrough opens new avenues for controlling chiral spintronics in oxide-based materials, laying the groundwork for next-generation spintronic and magnonic devices.