High Temperature Ferromagnetism with a Giant Magnetic Moment in Transparent Co-dopedSnO2−δ

The occurrence of room temperature ferromagnetism is demonstrated in pulsed laser deposited thin films of ${\mathrm{S}\mathrm{n}}_{1-x}{\mathrm{C}\mathrm{o}}_x{\mathrm{O}}_{2-\delta }$ ($x<0.3$). Interestingly, films of ${\mathrm{S}\mathrm{n}}_{0.95}{\mathrm{C}\mathrm{o}}_{0.05}{\mathrm{O}}_{2-\delta }$ grown on $R$-plane sapphire not only exhibit ferromagnetism with a Curie temperature close to 650 K, but also a giant magnetic moment of $7.5\pm 0.5{\mu }_B/\mathrm{C}\mathrm{o}$, not yet reported in any diluted magnetic semiconductor system. The films are semiconducting and optically highly transparent.