Research Projects

The discovery of 2DEG at the interface between LaAlO3 and SrTiO3 has led to extensive research into 2DEG in SrTiO3-based heterostructures. However, the mobility of carriers remains low compared to semiconductor 2DEG, limiting its practical application. Bulk SrTiO3 has a cubic structure at room temperature and undergoes a ferroelastic transition at 105 K. Recent studies have shown complex dynamics of domain walls with lowering temperatures. The 5d transition metal oxide, KTaO3, has gained interest due to its wide-band-gap insulator and quantum paraelectricity. The presence of heavy element Ta offers the possibility of achieving new emergent phases, such as nontrivial spin texture, due to strong spin-orbit coupling (SOC) in KTO-based heterostructures. KTO remains cubic down to low temperature and does not have a ferroelastic domain wall, allowing for exploration of emergent electronic and magnetic phenomena without the interference of ferroelastic domain wall dynamics. The superconducting transition temperature (Tc ~ 1.5-2.2 K) in KTaO3 substrates is almost one order of magnitude higher than the Tc of STO-based 2DEG. Understanding this 10-fold increase and engineering this superconducting phase is crucial for designing new materials with higher Tc. The study proposes exploring emergent electronic behavior and nontrivial spin textures in artificial materials containing KTO, focusing on manipulation of superconductivity, Rashba SOC in KTaO3-based heterostructure, understanding emergent electronic phenomena using synchrotron X-ray techniques, and investigating spin texture using bilinear magnetoresistance measurements.