Strain Induced Orbital Dynamics Across the Metal Insulator Transition in Thin VO2/TiO2 (001) Films

VO2 is a strongly correlated material, which undergoes a reversible metal insulator transition (MIT) coupled to a structural phase transition upon heating (T = 67 °C). Since its discovery, the nature of the insulating state has long been debated and different solid-state mechanisms have been proposed to explain its nature: Mott-Hubbard correlation, Peierls distortion, or a combination of both. Moreover, still now, there is a lack of consensus on the interplay between the different degrees of freedom: charge, lattice, orbital, and how they contribute to the MIT. In this manuscript, we will investigate across the MIT the orbital evolution induced by a tensile strain applied to thin VO2 films. The strained films allowed to study the interplay between orbital and lattice degrees of freedom and to clarify MIT properties.