Observation of uniaxial strain tuned spin cycloid in a freestanding BiFeO3 film

Non-collinear spin order that breaks space inversion symmetry and allows efficient electric-field control of magnetism makes BiFeO\(_3\) a promising candidate for applications in low-power spintronic devices. Epitaxial strain effects have been intensively studied and exhibit significant modulation o...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:arXiv.org 2022-10
Main Authors: Ding, Zhe, Sun, Yumeng, Zheng, Ningchong, Ma, Xingyue, Wang, Mengqi, Zang, Yipeng, Yu, Pei, Wang, Pengfei, Wang, Ya, Yang, Yurong, Nie, Yuefeng, Shi, Fazhan, Du, Jiangfeng
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Cycloids
Electric fields
First principles
Image acquisition
Spin structure
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Summary:Non-collinear spin order that breaks space inversion symmetry and allows efficient electric-field control of magnetism makes BiFeO\(_3\) a promising candidate for applications in low-power spintronic devices. Epitaxial strain effects have been intensively studied and exhibit significant modulation of the magnetic order in BiFeO\(_3\), but tuning its spin structure with continuously varied uniaxial strain is still lacking up to date. Here, we apply \emph{in situ} uniaxial strain to a freestanding BiFeO\(_3\) film and use scanning NV microscope to image the nanoscale magnetic order in real-space. The strain is continuously increased from 0\% to 1.5\% and four images under different strains are acquired during this period. The images show that the spin cycloid tilts by \(\sim 12.6^\circ\) when strain approaches 1.5\%. A first principle calculation has been processed to show that the tilting is energetically favorable under such strain. Our \emph{in situ} strain applying method in combination with scanning NV microscope real-space imaging ability paves a new way in studying the coupling between magnetic order and strain in BiFeO\(_3\) films.
ISSN:2331-8422