Principal Investigator Geoffrey Beach
Project Website http://beach.mit.edu/research/topics/magnetoelectric
Electric field control of the magnetic state of a material could enable new low-power logic devices and nonvolatile memory cells. Magneto-electric coupling has typically been achieved using complex materials such as multiferroic oxides, dilute magnetic semiconductors, or strain-coupled magnetostrictive/piezoelectric composites. Only recently, direct electrical control of magnetic anisotropy and Curie temperature has been demonstrated in transition metal ferromagnets at room temperature. These effects open the door to electrically gated spintronic devices based on materials amenable to integration with conventional semiconductor electronics.