Strain-engineering of magnetic coupling in two-dimensional magnetic semiconductor CrSiTe3: Competition of direct exchange interaction and superexchange interaction

In this paper, we demonstrate by the density functional theory calculations that the monolayer CrSiTe₃ is an intrinsic ferromagnetic semiconductor. More importantly, ferromagnetic stability can be enhanced significantly by applying an elastic tensile stain, implying their potential applications in spintronic devices at room temperature. In addition, a ferromagnetic-antiferromagnetic transition occurs under the small compression stain. The underlying physical mechanism is attributed to a competition effect of direct antiferromagnetic interaction and indirect ferromagnetic superexchange interaction.