- Karel, J;
- Zhang, YN;
- Bordel, C;
- Stone, KH;
- Chen, TY;
- Jenkins, CA;
- Smith, David J;
- Hu, J;
- Wu, RQ;
- Heald, SM;
- Kortright, JB;
- Hellman, F
Amorphous FexSi1-x thin films exhibit a striking enhancement in magnetization compared to crystalline films with the same composition (0.45 < x < 0.75), and xray magnetic circular dichroism reveals an enhancement in both spin and orbital moments in the amorphous films. Density functional theory (DFT) calculations reproduce this enhanced magnetization and also show a relatively large spinpolarization at the Fermi energy, also seen experimentally in Andreev reflection. Theory and experiment show that the amorphous materials have a decreased number of nearest neighbors and reduced number density relative to the crystalline samples of the same composition; the associated decrease in Fe-Si neighbors reduces the hybridization of Fe orbitals, leading to the enhanced moment.