Electrical Transport Signature of the Magnetic Fluctuation-Structure Relation in α-RuCl3 Nanoflakes

The small gap semiconductor α-RuCl3 has emerged as a promising candidate for quantum spin liquid materials. Thus far, Raman spectroscopy, neutron scattering, and magnetization measurements have provided valuable hints for collective spin behavior in α-RuCl3 bulk crystals. However, the goal of implementing α-RuCl3 into spintronic devices would strongly benefit from the possibility of electrically probing these phenomena. To address this, we first investigated nanoflakes of α-RuCl3 by Raman spectroscopy and observed similar behavior as in the case of the bulk material, including the signatures of possible fractionalized excitations. In complementary experiments, we investigated the electrical charge transport properties of individual α-RuCl3 nanoflakes in the temperature range between 120 and 290 K. The observed temperature-dependent electrical resistivity is consistent with variable range hopping behavior and exhibits a transition at about 180 K, close to the onset temperature observed in our Raman measure...