Large-scale multiferroic complex oxide epitaxy with magnetically switched polarization enabled by solution processing

Cong Liu; Feng An; Paria S M Gharavi; Qinwen Lu; Junkun Zha; Chao Chen; Liming Wang; Xiaozhi Zhan; Zedong Xu; Yuan Zhang; Ke Qu; Junxiang Yao; Yun Ou; Zhiming Zhao; Xiangli Zhong; Dongwen Zhang; Nagarajan Valanoor; Lang Chen; Tao Zhu; Deyang Chen; Xiaofang Zhai; Peng Gao; Tingting Jia; Shuhong Xie; Gaokuo Zhong; Jiangyu Li

doi:10.1093/nsr/nwz143

Large-scale multiferroic complex oxide epitaxy with magnetically switched polarization enabled by solution processing

Natl Sci Rev. 2020 Jan;7(1):84-91. doi: 10.1093/nsr/nwz143. Epub 2019 Oct 8.

Authors

Cong Liu¹, Feng An^{1

2}, Paria S M Gharavi³, Qinwen Lu⁴, Junkun Zha⁴, Chao Chen⁵, Liming Wang⁶, Xiaozhi Zhan⁶, Zedong Xu⁷, Yuan Zhang², Ke Qu^{1

8}, Junxiang Yao¹, Yun Ou^{1

9}, Zhiming Zhao², Xiangli Zhong², Dongwen Zhang¹⁰, Nagarajan Valanoor³, Lang Chen⁷, Tao Zhu^{6

11

12}, Deyang Chen⁵, Xiaofang Zhai⁴, Peng Gao⁸, Tingting Jia¹, Shuhong Xie², Gaokuo Zhong¹, Jiangyu Li¹

Affiliations

¹ Shenzhen Key Laboratory of Nanobiomechanics, Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Shenzhen 518005, China.
² School of Materials Science and Engineering, Xiangtan University, Xiangtan 411105, China.
³ School of Materials Science and Engineering, University of New South Wales, Sydney, NSW 2052, Australia.
⁴ Hefei National Laboratory for Physical Sciences at Microscale and Department of Chemical Physics, University of Science and Technology of China, Hefei 230026, China.
⁵ Institute for Advanced Materials and Guangdong Provincial Key Laboratory of Optical Information Materials and Technology, South China Academy of Advanced Optoelectronics, South China Normal University, Guangzhou 510006, China.
⁶ Dongguan Neutron Science Center, Dongguan 523803, China.
⁷ Department of Physics, Southern University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen 518005, China.
⁸ International Center for Quantum Materials and Electron Microscopy Laboratory, School of Physics, Peking University, Beijing 100871, China.
⁹ Hunan Provincial Key Laboratory of Health Maintenance for Mechanical Equipment, Hunan University of Science and Technology, Xiangtan 411201, China.
¹⁰ Department of Physics, College of Science, National University of Defense Technology, Changsha 410073, China.
¹¹ Beijing National Laboratory for Condensed Matter Physics and Institute of Physics, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100190, China.
¹² Songshan Lake Materials Laboratory, Dongguan Neutron Science Center, Dongguan 523808, China.

Abstract

Complex oxides with tunable structures have many fascinating properties, though high-quality complex oxide epitaxy with precisely controlled composition is still out of reach. Here we have successfully developed solution-based single-crystalline epitaxy for multiferroic (1-x)BiTi_(1-y)/2Fe _y Mg_(1-y)/2O₃-(x)CaTiO₃ (BTFM-CTO) solid solution in large area, confirming its ferroelectricity at the atomic scale with strong spontaneous polarization. Careful compositional tuning leads to a bulk magnetization of 0.07 ± 0.035 μ_B/Fe at room temperature, enabling magnetically induced polarization switching exhibiting a large magnetoelectric coefficient of 2.7-3.0 × 10^-7 s/m. This work demonstrates the great potential of solution processing in large-scale complex oxide epitaxy and establishes novel room-temperature magnetoelectric coupling in epitaxial BTFM-CTO film, making it possible to explore a much wider space of composition, phase, and structure that can be easily scaled up for industrial applications.

Keywords: complex oxide; epitaxy; multiferroic; solution method.