Welcome to NSF-NIRT site on Active Multiferroic Nanostructures!
Magnetoelectric multiferroics are materials in which ferromagnetism and
ferroelectricity occur simultaneously in the same phase and allow coupling
between the ferromagnetic and ferroelectric phase.
From Spaldin & Fiebig, Science 309:391 (2005). Reprinted with
permission from
AAAS.
Integration of multiferroic materials on semiconductor substrates would lead to on-chip integration of very important components of advanced devices: 1) magnetics and 2) ferroelectrics.
Most of the known single phase bulk magnetoelectric materials do not exhibit
strong magnetoelectric coupling. But large magnetoelectric effects have been
discovered in composites, laminates and more recently in nanostructured
materials. In this NSF-NIRT project, our efforts are focused on developing nanostructures of these artificial
multilayered magnetoelectric materials to achieve increased functionality in
advanced nano-devices. This is one of the first interdisciplinary efforts to
investigate nano-epitaxy (by 3 different techniques), theoretical modeling, and
detailed magneto-electric measurements in magneto-electric nanostructures in
thin film or nanopillar/nanowire form.
From
Zheng et al, Science 303:661 (2004).
Reprinted with permission from
AAAS.