Epitaxial stabilization of ferromagnetism in FeGe nanowires

Epitaixial monoclinic FeGe nanowires have been grown on Ge(111) along the <11-1> direction. Whereas monoclinic FeGe is antiferromagnetic in the bulk, the nanowires are surprisingly strong ferromagnets below ~200 K, with an average magnetic moment of 0.8 μB per Fe atom. Density functional calculations indicate that the observed ferromagnetism is stabilized by lattice compression, which destabilizes the antiferromagnetic Peierls-like ground state.