Strain Control of Giant Magnetic Anisotropy in Metallic Perovskite SrCoO3−δ Thin Films

Authors

Songbai Hu, South University of Science and Technology of China, Wuhan University, University of New South Wales
Claudio Cazorla, University of New South Wales
Feixiang Xiang, University of WollongongFollow
Hongfei Ma, South University of Science and technology of China
Jianyuan Wang, Northwestern Polytechnical University
Jianbo Wang, Wuhan University
Xiaolin Wang, University of WollongongFollow
Clemens Ulrich, University of New South Wales
Lang Chen, South University of Science and technology of China
Jan Seidel, University of New South WalesFollow

RIS ID

129070

Publication Details

Hu, S., Cazorla, C., Xiang, F., Ma, H., Wang, J., Wang, J., Wang, X., Ulrich, C., Chen, L. & Seidel, J. (2018). Strain Control of Giant Magnetic Anisotropy in Metallic Perovskite SrCoO3−δ Thin Films. ACS Applied Materials and Interfaces, 10 (26), 22348-22355.

Abstract

Magnetic materials with large magnetic anisotropy are essential for workaday applications such as permanent magnets and magnetic data storage. There is widespread interest in finding efficient ways of controlling magnetic anisotropy, among which strain control has proven to be a very powerful technique. Here, we demonstrate the strain-mediated magnetic anisotropy in SrCoO3−δ thin film, a perovskite oxide that is metallic and adopts a cubic structure at δ ≤ 0.25. We find that the easy-magnetization axis in SrCoO3−δ can be rotated by 90° upon application of moderate epitaxial strains ranging from −1.2 to +1.8%. The magnetic anisotropy in compressive SrCoO3−δ thin films is huge, as shown by magnetic hysteresis loops rendering an anisotropy energy density of ∼106 erg/cm3 . The local variance in magnetic force microscopy upon temperature and magnetic field reveals that the evolution of magnetic domains in the SCO thin film is strongly dependent on magnetic anisotropy