Multiferroics: a magnetic twist for ferroelectricity

 Magnetism and ferroelectricity are essential to many forms of current technology, and the quest for multiferroic materials, where these two phenomena are intimately coupled, is of great technological and fundamental importance. Ferroelectricity and magnetism tend to be mutually exclusive and interact weakly with each other when they coexist. The exciting new development is the discovery that even a weak magnetoelectric interaction can lead to spectacular cross-coupling effects when it induces electric polarization in a magnetically ordered state. Such magnetic ferroelectricity, showing an unprecedented sensitivity to ap plied magnetic fields, occurs in 'frustrated magnets' with competing interactions between spins and complex magnetic orders. We summarize key experimental findings and the current theoretical understanding of these phenomena, which have great potential for tuneable multifunctional devices.

Read the article    from Nature By Sang-Wook Cheong^1,2 & Maxim Mostovoy³ 

1. Rutgers Center for Emergent Materials and Department of Physics & Astronomy, 136 Frelinghuysen Road, Piscataway 08854, New Jersey, USA.
2. Laboratory of Pohang Emergent Materials and Department of Physics, Pohang University of Science and Technology, Pohang 790-784, Korea.
3. Materials Science Center, University of Groningen, Nijenborgh 4, 9747 AG Groningen, The Netherlands.

Correspondence to: Sang-Wook Cheong^1,2 e-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.

Correspondence to: Maxim Mostovoy³ e-mail: This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.