Nonreciprocal and Nonvolatile Electric-Field Switching of Magnetism in van der Waals Heterostructure Multiferroics

Yangliu Wu; Deju Zhang; Yan-Ning Zhang; Longjiang Deng; Bo Peng

doi:10.1021/acs.nanolett.3c03970

Nonreciprocal and Nonvolatile Electric-Field Switching of Magnetism in van der Waals Heterostructure Multiferroics

Nano Lett. 2024 Apr 24. doi: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.3c03970. Online ahead of print.

Authors

Yangliu Wu^{1

2}, Deju Zhang³, Yan-Ning Zhang³, Longjiang Deng^{1

2}, Bo Peng^{1

2}

Affiliations

¹ National Engineering Research Center of Electromagnetic Radiation Control Materials, School of Electronic Science and Engineering, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, People's Republic of China.
² Key Laboratory of Multi Spectral Absorbing Materials and Structures of Ministry of Education, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, People's Republic of China.
³ Institute of Fundamental and Frontier Sciences, University of Electronic Science and Technology of China, Chengdu 611731, People's Republic of China.

PMID: 38655909
DOI: 10.1021/acs.nanolett.3c03970

Abstract

Multiferroic materials provide robust and efficient routes for the control of magnetism by electric fields, which have been diligently sought after for a long time. Construction of two-dimensional (2D) vdW multiferroics is a more exciting endeavor. To date, the nonvolatile manipulation of magnetism through ferroelectric polarization still remains challenging in a 2D vdW heterostructure multiferroic. Here, we report a van der Waals (vdW) heterostructure multiferroic comprising the atomically thin layered antiferromagnet (AFM) CrI₃ and ferroelectric (FE) α-In₂Se₃. We demonstrate anomalously nonreciprocal and nonvolatile electric-field control of magnetization by ferroelectric polarization. The nonreciprocal electric control originates from an intriguing antisymmetric enhancement of interlayer ferromagnetic coupling in the opposite ferroelectric polarization configurations of α-In₂Se₃. Our work provides numerous possibilities for creating diverse heterostructure multiferroics at the limit of a few atomic layers for multistage magnetic memories and brain-inspired in-memory computing.

Keywords: 2D magnet; 2D vdW multiferroics; ferroelectric; nonvolatile magnetoelectric coupling; spintronics.