We study the voltage control of perpendicular magnetic anisotropy in an ultrathin Fe layer sandwiched between the Cr buffer and MgO tunneling barrier layers. A high-interface magnetic anisotropy energy of 2.1 mJ=m 2 is achieved in the Cr/ultrathin Fe=MgO structure. A large voltage-induced perpendicular magnetic anisotropy change is observed under the negative-bias voltage applications for the case of the Fe layer thinner than 0.6 nm. The amplitude of the voltage-induced anisotropy energy change exhibits a strong Fe-thickness dependence and it reaches as high as 290 fJ=Vm. The observed high values of the surface anisotropy and voltage-induced anisotropy energy change demonstrate the feasibility of voltage-driven spintronic devices.

Voltage control of spin enables both a zero standby power and ultralow active power consumption in spintronic devices, such as magnetoresistive random-access memory devices. A practical approach to achieve voltage control is the electrical modulation of the spin-orbit interaction at the interface between 3d-transition-ferromagnetic-metal and dielectric layers in a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ). However, we need to initiate a new guideline for materials design to improve both the voltage-controlled magnetic anisotropy (VCMA) and perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA). Here we report that atomic-scale doping of iridium in an ultrathin Fe layer is highly effective to improving these properties in Fe/MgO-based MTJs. A large interfacial PMA energy, K i,0 , of up to 3.7 mJ m − 2 was obtained, which was 1.8 times greater than that of the pure Fe/MgO interface. Moreover, iridium doping yielded a huge VCMA coefficient (up to 320 fJ Vm − 1 ) as well as high-speed response. First-principles calculations revealed that Ir atoms dispersed within the Fe layer play a considerable role in enhancing K i,0 and the VCMA coefficient. These results demonstrate the efficacy of heavy-metal doping in ferromagnetic layers as an advanced approach to develop high-density voltage-driven spintronic devices. NPG Asia Materials (2017) 9, e451; doi:10.1038/am.2017.204; published online 5 December 2017 INTRODUCTIONSpintronic devices, such as a magnetoresistive random-access memory device using a MgO-based magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ), 1,2 are expected to reduce the standby power of future computing systems by utilizing the non-volatile feature of magnetism. However, one significant challenge emerges from reducing the energy for information writing: magnetization switching. This issue is caused by electriccurrent-based operations of spintronic devices using electric-currentinduced magnetic fields, spin-transfer torque (STT) and spin-orbit torque based on the spin Hall effect rather than the electric-field-based operations presently used for semiconductor devices. For example, recent developments of STT-magnetoresistive random access memory have achieved~100 fJ per bit writing energies, 3 which corresponds to 10 7 k B T, where k B is the Boltzmann constant and T is the temperature (assumed to be 300 K here). In contrast, the energy required for maintaining magnetic information, that is, thermal stability, is between 60 k B T and 100 k B T. This large energy gap between data writing and retention, on the order of 10 5 , mainly originates

Recently, perpendicular magnetic anisotropy (PMA) and its voltage control (VC) was demonstrated for Cr/Fe/MgO. In this study, we shed light on the origin of large voltage-induced anisotropy change in Cr/Fe/MgO. Analysis of the chemical structure of Cr/Fe/MgO revealed the existence of Cr atoms in the proximity of the Fe/MgO interface, which can affect both magnetic anisotropy (MA) and its VC. We showed that PMA and its VC can be enhanced by controlled Cr doping at the Fe/MgO interface. For Cr/Fe (5.9 Å)/Cr (0.7 Å)/MgO with an effective PMA of 0.8 MJ/m3, a maximum value of the voltage-controlled magnetic anisotropy (VCMA) effect of 370 fJ/Vm was demonstrated due to Cr insertion.