Magnetoelectric effects at the interfaces between nonmagnetic perovskites: Ab initio prediction

¹ State Key Laboratory of Structural Chemistry, Fujian Institute of Research on the Structure of Matter, Chinese Academy of Sciences - Fuzhou, 350002, Fujian, PRC
² University of Chinese Academy of Sciences - Beijing, 100049, PRC

Received: 26 August 2013
Accepted: 3 January 2014

Abstract

A novel mechanism of magnetoelectric coupling at the KTaO₃/BaTiO₃ interfaces composed of nonmagnetic ferroelectric insulators is studied by density functional theory methods. We show that holes created by electronic reconstruction concentrate near the interface, which is significantly different from the distribution of holes in the LaAlO₃/SrTiO₃ model system (Chen H. H. et al., Phys. Rev. B, 79 (2009) 161402(R)). A large concentration of holes induces ferromagnetism at the interface. When ferroelectric polarization reverses, the ratio of the net change in magnetization to the total is about ten percent. This ratio is improved greatly compared with typical Fe/BaTiO₃ heterostructures (Duan C. G. et al., Phys. Rev. Lett., 97 (2006) 047201), where the ratio is about one percent. The results provide an opportunity for searching multiferroic materials and offer the possibility to design spintronics devices.