Magneto-optical effects of an artificially-layered ferromagnetic topological insulator with T$_C$ of 160 K

Abstract

Magnetic topological insulator is a fertile platform to study the interplay between magnetism and topology. The unique electronic band structure can induce exotic transport and optical properties. However, a comprehensive optical study in both near-infrared frequency and terahertz frequency has been lacking. Here, we report magneto-optical effects from a heterostructure of Cr-incorporated topological insulator, CBST. We use 800 nm magneto-optical Kerr effect to reveal a ferromagnetic order in the CBST film with a high transition temperature at 160 K. We also use time-domain terahertz polarimetry to reveal a terahertz Faraday rotation of 1.5 mrad and Kerr rotation of 5.1 mrad at 2 K. The calculated terahertz Hall conductance is 0.42 $e^2/h$. Our work shows the optical responses of an artificially layered magnetic topological insulator, paving the way towards high-temperature quantum anomalous Hall effect via heterostructure engineering.