Electrically enhanced magnetization in highly strained BiFeO₃ films

The control of magnetism via an electric field has attracted substantial attention because of potential applications in magnetoelectronics, spintronics and high-frequency devices. In this study, we demonstrate a new approach to enhance and control the magnetization of multiferroic thin film by an electric stimulus. First, to reduce the strength of the antiferromagnetic superexchange interaction in BiFeO₃, we applied strain engineering to stabilize a highly strained phase. Second, the direction of the ferroelectric polarization was controlled by an electric field to enhance the Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction in the highly strained BiFeO₃ phase. Because of the magnetoelectric coupling in BiFeO₃, a strong correlation between the modulated ferroelectricity and enhanced magnetization was observed. The tunability of this strong correlation by an electric field provides an intriguing route to control ferromagnetism in a single-phase multiferroic.