Antiferromagnetic Nanoscale Bit Arrays of Magnetoelectric CrO Thin Films.

Magnetism of oxide antiferromagnets (AFMs) has been studied in single crystals and extended thin films. The properties of AFM nanostructures still remain underexplored. Here, we report on the fabrication and magnetic imaging of granular 100 nm-thick magnetoelectric CrO films patterned in circular bits with diameters ranging from 500 down to 100 nm.

Flexomagnetism and vertically graded Néel temperature of antiferromagnetic CrO thin films.

Antiferromagnetic insulators are a prospective materials platform for magnonics, spin superfluidity, THz spintronics, and non-volatile data storage. A magnetomechanical coupling in antiferromagnets offers vast advantages in the control and manipulation of the primary order parameter yet remains largely unexplored. Here, we discover a new member in the family of flexoeffects in thin films of CrO.

Defect Nanostructure and its Impact on Magnetism of α-Cr O Thin Films.

Thin films of the magnetoelectric insulator α-Cr O are technologically relevant for energy-efficient magnetic memory devices controlled by electric fields. In contrast to single crystals, the quality of thin Cr O films is usually compromised by the presence of point defects and their agglomerations at grain boundaries, putting into question their application potential. Here, the impact of the defect nanostructure, including sparse small-volume defects and their complexes is studied on the magnetic properties of Cr O thin films.

Printable and Stretchable Giant Magnetoresistive Sensors for Highly Compliant and Skin-Conformal Electronics.

Highly compliant electronics, naturally conforming to human skin, represent a paradigm shift in the interplay with the surroundings. Solution-processable printing technologies are yet to be developed to comply with requirements to mechanical conformability of on-skin appliances. Here, it is demonstrated that high-performance spintronic elements can be printed on ultrathin 3 µm thick polymeric foils enabling the mechanically imperceptible printed magnetoelectronics, which can adapt to the periodic buckling surface to be biaxially stretched over 100%.

Two Orders of Magnitude Boost in the Detection Limit of Droplet-Based Micro-Magnetofluidics with Planar Hall Effect Sensors.

Magnetofluidics is a dynamic research field, which requires novel sensor solutions to boost the detection limit of tiny quantities of magnetized objects. Here, we present a sensing strategy relying on planar Hall effect sensors in droplet-based micro-magnetofluidics for the detection of a multiphase liquid flow, i.e.

Nanomagnetism of Magnetoelectric Granular Thin-Film Antiferromagnets.

Antiferromagnets have recently emerged as attractive platforms for spintronics applications, offering fundamentally new functionalities compared with their ferromagnetic counterparts. Whereas nanoscale thin-film materials are key to the development of future antiferromagnetic spintronic technologies, existing experimental tools tend to suffer from low resolution or expensive and complex equipment requirements. We offer a simple, high-resolution alternative by addressing the ubiquitous surface magnetization of magnetoelectric antiferromagnets in a granular thin-film sample on the nanoscale using single-spin magnetometry in combination with spin-sensitive transport experiments.

Purely antiferromagnetic magnetoelectric random access memory.

Magnetic random access memory schemes employing magnetoelectric coupling to write binary information promise outstanding energy efficiency. We propose and demonstrate a purely antiferromagnetic magnetoelectric random access memory (AF-MERAM) that offers a remarkable 50-fold reduction of the writing threshold compared with ferromagnet-based counterparts, is robust against magnetic disturbances and exhibits no ferromagnetic hysteresis losses. Using the magnetoelectric antiferromagnet CrO, we demonstrate reliable isothermal switching via gate voltage pulses and all-electric readout at room temperature.

All-Electric Access to the Magnetic-Field-Invariant Magnetization of Antiferromagnets.

The rich physics of thin film antiferromagnets can be harnessed for prospective spintronic devices given that all-electric assessment of the tiny uncompensated magnetic moment is achieved. On the example of magnetoelectric antiferromagnetic Cr2O3, we prove that spinning-current anomalous Hall magnetometry serves as an all-electric method to probe the field-invariant uncompensated magnetization of antiferromagnets. We obtain direct access to the surface magnetization of magnetoelectric antiferromagnets providing a read-out method for ferromagnet-free magnetoelectric memory.

Magnetically capped rolled-up nanomembranes.

Modifying the curvature in magnetic nanostructures is a novel and elegant way toward tailoring physical phenomena at the nanoscale, allowing one to overcome limitations apparent in planar counterparts. Here, we address curvature-driven changes of static magnetic properties in cylindrically curved magnetic segments with different radii of curvature. The curved architectures are prepared by capping nonmagnetic micrometer- and nanometer-sized rolled-up membranes with a soft-magnetic 20 nm thick permalloy (Ni(80)Fe(20)) film.