On-Surface Magnetometry: The Evaluation of Superexchange Coupling Constants in Surface-Wired Single-Molecule Magnets

A comfortable environment: Interaction with a gold surface fully preserves the spin structure of a Fe3Cr single-molecule magnet of current interest in molecular spintronics. Magnetic polarization at metal sites is measured over a broad temperature range (from 10 to 300 K) by X-ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD), which provides the required monolayer sensitivity. The data are used to evaluate Fe-Cr superexchange coupling interactions, which compare well with bulk-phase values in both sign and strength