Defects mediated ferromagnetism in a V-doped 6H-SiC single crystal

Undoped and V-doped 6H-SiC single crystals have been grown by the physical vapor transport method.The V concentration is determined to be 3.76×1017 at/cm3 and 6.14×1017 at/cm3 by secondary ion mass spectrometry for low V-doped and high V-doped SiC samples,respectively.The undoped 6H-SiC shows diamagnetism,while the V-doped 6H-SiC exhibits weak ferromagnetism.The lower V-doped sample shows stronger ferromagnetism compared to that of the higher V-doped sample.However,the structural characterization indicates that the lower V-doped SiC has a relative poor crystalline quality.It is found that both V dopants and defects are essential for introducing ferromagnetic exchange in V-doped SiC single crystals.