$\mu$SR measurements of 3D Ising ferromagnetism in bulk Fe$_3$GeTe$_2$ crystals

Abstract

Fe$_3$GeTe$_2$ is a quasi-two-dimensional itinerant ferromagnet with a van-der-Waals layered structure that exhibits substantial magnetic anisotropy. In bulk samples, this material becomes magnetically ordered below 220~K, while in thin samples, the gate-tunability of the ferromagnetic moment has attracted significant interest. Alongside high-temperature ferromagnetism, a low-temperature magnetic state occurs whose nature has not been conclusively identified, with some studies suggesting a transition between ferromagnetism and antiferromagnetism with temperature. Here we present magnetometry and $\mu$SR data that demonstrate that Fe$_3$GeTe$_2$ exhibits three-dimenional Ising-like ferromagnetism over the entire temperature range between $T_{C}=220$~K and 2~K. The feature at 170~K that has previously been proposed to be a transition to antiferromagnetism is instead likely to represent a domain-freezing transition.