Magnetic nanoparticles provide a unique combination of small size and responsiveness to magnetic fields making them attractive for applications in electronics, biology, and medicine. When exposed to alternating magnetic fields, magnetic nanoparticles can generate heat through loss power mechanisms that continue to challenge a complete physical description. The influence of internal nanoparticle (intracore) magnetic domain structure on relaxation remains unexplored. Within the context of potential biomedical applications, this study focuses on the dramatic differences observed among the specific loss power of three magnetic iron oxide nanoparticle constructs having comparable size and chemical composition. Analysis of polarization analyzed small angle neutron scattering data reveals unexpected and complex coupling among magnetic domains within the nanoparticle cores that influences their interactions with external magnetic fields. These results challenge the prevailing concepts in hyperthermia which limit consideration to size and shape of magnetic single domain nanoparticles.

The nanomagnetism of monodisperse 7 nm γ-Fe2O3 nanoparticles exhibits unique features due to a significant amount of surface spin disorder. To correctly characterize the superparamagnetism of a dilute dispersion requires including the effects of the magnetic anisotropy and a shell of disordered spins surrounding the ordered core. The nanoparticle shell’s disordered spin structure is exchange coupled to that of the ordered core. This enables an exchange bias loop shift, Hex, when the nanoparticle dispersion is field cooled. The surface spin disorder also leads to an unusual exponential-like decrease of the nanoparticle’s total saturation magnetization with increasing temperature.

Protein cages such as ferritin and viral capsids are interesting building blocks for nanotechnology due to their monodisperse structure and ability to encapsulate various functional moieties. Here we show that recombinant ferritin protein cages encapsulating Fe(3)O(4)-γ-Fe(2)O(3) iron oxide (magnetoferritin) nanoparticles and photodegradable Newkome-type dendrons self-assemble into micrometer-sized complexes with a face-centered-cubic (fcc) superstructure and a lattice constant of 13.1 nm. The magnetic properties of the magnetoferritin particles are affected directly by the hierarchical organization. Magnetoferritin nanoparticles dispersed in water exhibit typical magnetism of single domain noninteracting nanoparticles; however, the same nanoparticles organized into fcc superstructures show clearly the effects of the altered magnetostatic (e.g., dipole-dipole) interactions by exhibiting, for example, different hysteresis of the field-dependent magnetization. The magnetoferritin-dendron assemblies can be efficiently disassembled by a short optical stimulus resulting in release of free magnetoferritin particles. After the triggered release the nanomagnetic properties of the pristine magnetoferritin nanoparticles are regained.

The coexistence and coupling of ferroelasticity and magnetic ordering in a single material offers a great opportunity to realize novel devices with multiple tuning knobs. Complex oxides are a particularly promising class of materials to find multiferroic interactions due to their rich phase diagrams, and are sensitive to external perturbations. Still, there are very few examples of these systems. Here, we report the observation of twin domains in ferroelastic LaCoO3 epitaxial films and their geometric control of structural symmetry intimately linked to the material’s electronic and magnetic states. A unidirectional structural modulation is achieved by selective choice of substrates having twofold rotational symmetry. This modulation perturbs the crystal field–splitting energy, leading to unexpected in-plane anisotropy of orbital configuration and magnetization. These findings demonstrate the use of structural modulation to control multiferroic interactions and may enable a great potential for stimulation of exotic phenomena through artificial domain engineering.

We report magnetic measurements on a macroscopic three-dimensional fcc array of iron-oxide nanoparticles. We observe typical nanomagnetism for the randomly packed configuration of nanoparticles, including dynamical freezing and superparamagnetism. By contrast, the nanoparticle "atoms" in the fcc configuration that form the crystal exhibit a low coercivity that is weakly temperature dependent with no superparamagnetism up to 400 K.

Chiral interactions in magnetic systems can give rise to rich physics manifested, for example, as nontrivial spin textures. The foremost interaction responsible for chiral magnetism is the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI), resulting from inversion symmetry breaking in the presence of strong spin-orbit coupling. However, the atomistic origin of DMIs and their relationship to emergent electrodynamic phenomena, such as topological Hall effect (THE), remain unclear. Here, we investigate the role of interfacial DMIs in 3d–5d transition metal-oxide-based LaMnO3/SrIrO3 superlattices on THE from a chiral spin texture. By additively engineering the interfacial inversion symmetry with atomic-scale precision, we directly link the competition between interfacial collinear ferromagnetic interactions and DMIs to an enhanced THE. The ability to control the DMI and resulting THE points to a pathway for harnessing interfacial structures to maximize the density of chiral spin textures useful for developing high-density information storage and quantum magnets for quantum information science.

Deliberate control of oxygen vacancy formation and migration in perovskite oxide thin films is important for developing novel electronic and iontronic devices. Here, it is found that the concentration of oxygen vacancies (V ) formed in LaNiO (LNO) during pulsed laser deposition is strongly affected by the chemical potential mismatch between the LNO film and its proximal layers. Increasing the V concentration in LNO significantly modifies the degree of orbital polarization and drives the metal-insulator transition. Changes in the nickel oxidization state and carrier concentration in the films are confirmed by soft X-ray absorption spectroscopy and optical spectroscopy. The ability to unidirectional-control the oxygen flow across the heterointerface, e.g., a so-called "oxygen diode", by exploiting chemical potential mismatch at interfaces provides a new avenue to tune the physical and electrochemical properties of complex oxides.

No abstract