Electric Field Control of Fe Nano Magnets: Towards Metallic Nonvolatile Data Storage Devices

Abstract

Magnetoelectric coupling at metal surfaces opens up a new possibility for metallic nonvolatile magnetic data-storage devices, in which the magnetic bits are controlled by an electric field. We studied the atomic and magnetic order in bilayer Fe nano-islands grown on a Cu(111) substrate with a scanning tunneling microscopy setup in ultra high vacuum at 4.5 K. Electric field pulses (108–109 V/m) were found to be able to cause a displacement of the Fe atoms, switching simultaneously the crystalline and the magnetic order, which is the prove of magnetoelectric coupling at the metallic Fe surface. We also succeeded in controlling the direction of the switching by the polarity of the electric field.

Dynamics of Electrically Driven Martensitic Phase Transitions in Fe Nanoislands

“…Thus, the analysis of the switching dynamics confirms our prior observations [9,20] that by the application of large electric fields, either the bcc or fcc phase can be induced. The analysis of the dynamics of the martensitic phase transition, however, allows us to give quantitative energy differences and energy barriers as functions of the electric field.…”

Electrodeposition of iron from 1-ethyl-3-methylimidazolium trifluoromethanesulfonate and reverse microemulsions of Triton X-100

“…Iron (Fe) is one of the most naturally abundant, low-cost metals with versatile applications in daily life [ 1 ]. Multipurpose applications of metallic iron and its alloys include corrosion-resistant coatings [ 2 , 3 ], magnetic recording devices [ 4 ], transformer core materials [ 5 ], drug delivery [ 6 ], electroforming [ 7 ], catalysis [ 8 , 9 ], etc.…”