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Amorphous magnetic alloys with large perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) have emerged as a suitable material choice for spintronic memory and high-frequency non-reciprocal devices on-chip. Unlike ferromagnets, ferrimagnets offer faster switching dynamics, lower net saturation magnetization, minimal stray field and a lower net angular momentum. Ferrimagnetic thin films of Gd x Co 1− x sputter deposited as heterostructures of Ta/Pt/Gd x Co 1− x (t)/Pt on Si/SiO 2 have bulk-like PMA for thicknesses of 5–12 nm and room-temperature magnetic compensation for x = 28–32%. Preferential oxygenation of GdCo has been found to increase the effective anisotropy energy density by an order of magnitude and produce near-ideal remanence ratios. X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy accurately quantifies the metal-oxidation ratio, which shows that an oxygen-rich and Co-deficient stoichiometry (Gd 21 Co 28 O 51 ) likely weakens the ferromagnetic exchange interaction between Co–Co and contributes additional antiferromagnetic exchange through superexchange-like interactions between Gd and Co via O, resulting in a stronger out-of-plane magnetization. Even greater PMA and giant-anisotropy field of 11 kOe are achieved in super-lattices of the Gd 21 Co 28 O 51 heterostructure. The combination of ferrimagnetic ordering in amorphous Gd x Co 1− x and its affordance of pathways for engineering large PMA will enable the design of integrated high-frequency devices beyond 30 GHz and ultrafast energy efficient memory devices with switching speeds down to tens of picoseconds. 

We report the structural and electronic properties of NbN/GaN junctions grown by plasma-assisted molecular beam epitaxy. High crystal-quality NbN films grown on GaN exhibit superconducting critical temperatures in excess of 10 K for thicknesses as low as 3 nm. We observe that the NbN lattice adopts the stacking sequence of the underlying GaN and that domain boundaries in the NbN thereby occur at the site of atomic steps in the GaN surface. The electronic properties of the NbN/GaN junction are characterized using Schottky barrier diodes. Current–voltage–temperature and capacitance–voltage measurements are used to determine the Schottky barrier height of the NbN/GaN junction, which we conclude is ∼1.3 eV.