Strain-induced robust magnetic anisotropy and room temperature magnetoelectric coupling effect in epitaxial SmFeO3 film

Rare-earth orthoferrite SmFeO 3 is an outstanding single-phase multiferroic material, holding great potential in novel low-power electronic devices. Nevertheless, simultaneous magnetic and ferroelectric orders as well as magnetoelectric (ME) coupling effect at room temperature (RT) in this system ha...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published inScience China materials Vol. 63; no. 10; pp. 2062 - 2070
Main Authors Zhang, Jun, Xue, Wuhong, Su, Tiancong, Ji, Huihui, Yan, Zhi, Zhou, Guowei, Quan, Zhiyong, Xu, Xiaohong
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Beijing Science China Press 01.10.2020
Springer Nature B.V
Subjects
Chemistry and Materials Science
Chemistry/Food Science
Coupling
Data storage
Electronic devices
Ferroelectric materials
Ferroelectricity
Ferromagnetic materials
Film thickness
Magnetic anisotropy
Magnetic switching
Materials Science
Multiferroic materials
Occupancy
Pulsed laser deposition
Pulsed lasers
Rare earth elements
Room temperature
Strontium titanates
Substrates
SmFeO
magnetic anisotropy
magnetoelectric coupling
film
multiferroicity
Online AccessGet full text

Cover

More Information
Summary:Rare-earth orthoferrite SmFeO 3 is an outstanding single-phase multiferroic material, holding great potential in novel low-power electronic devices. Nevertheless, simultaneous magnetic and ferroelectric orders as well as magnetoelectric (ME) coupling effect at room temperature (RT) in this system have not been demonstrated yet. In this study, epitaxial SmFeO 3 films were successfully prepared onto tensile-strain Nb-SrTiO 3 (Nb-STO) substrates by a pulsed laser deposition (PLD) method. Measurement results show that the films exhibit obvious ferromagnetic and ferroelectric orders at RT. Meanwhile, the magnetic anisotropy gradually changes from out-of-plane (OP) to in-plane (IP) direction with increasing film thickness, which is attributed to the variations of O 2p-Fe 3d hybridization intensity and Fe 3d-orbit occupancy caused by the strain-relaxed effect. Moreover, electrically driven reversible magnetic switching further proves that the SmFeO 3 films exhibit the RT ME coupling effect, suggesting promising applications in new-generation electric-write magnetic-read data storage devices.
ISSN:2095-8226
2199-4501
DOI:10.1007/s40843-020-1391-3