TY - JOUR
T1 - Magnetoelectric effect and phase transitions in CuO in external magnetic fields
AU - Wang, Zhaosheng
AU - Qureshi, Navid
AU - Yasin, Shadi
AU - Mukhin, Alexander
AU - Ressouche, Eric
AU - Zherlitsyn, Sergei
AU - Skourski, Yurii
AU - Geshev, Julian
AU - Ivanov, Vsevolod
AU - Gospodinov, Marin
AU - Skumryev, Vassil
PY - 2016/1/18
Y1 - 2016/1/18
N2 - © 2016, Nature Publishing Group. All rights reserved. Apart from being so far the only known binary multiferroic compound, CuO has a much higher transition temperature into the multiferroic state, 230K, than any other known material in which the electric polarization is induced by spontaneous magnetic order, typically lower than 100K. Although the magnetically induced ferroelectricity of CuO is firmly established, no magnetoelectric effect has been observed so far as direct crosstalk between bulk magnetization and electric polarization counterparts. Here we demonstrate that high magnetic fields of ≈50T are able to suppress the helical modulation of the spins in the multiferroic phase and dramatically affect the electric polarization. Furthermore, just below the spontaneous transition from commensurate (paraelectric) to incommensurate (ferroelectric) structures at 213K, even modest magnetic fields induce a transition into the incommensurate structure and then suppress it at higher field. Thus, remarkable hidden magnetoelectric features are uncovered, establishing CuO as prototype multiferroic with abundance of competitive magnetic interactions.
AB - © 2016, Nature Publishing Group. All rights reserved. Apart from being so far the only known binary multiferroic compound, CuO has a much higher transition temperature into the multiferroic state, 230K, than any other known material in which the electric polarization is induced by spontaneous magnetic order, typically lower than 100K. Although the magnetically induced ferroelectricity of CuO is firmly established, no magnetoelectric effect has been observed so far as direct crosstalk between bulk magnetization and electric polarization counterparts. Here we demonstrate that high magnetic fields of ≈50T are able to suppress the helical modulation of the spins in the multiferroic phase and dramatically affect the electric polarization. Furthermore, just below the spontaneous transition from commensurate (paraelectric) to incommensurate (ferroelectric) structures at 213K, even modest magnetic fields induce a transition into the incommensurate structure and then suppress it at higher field. Thus, remarkable hidden magnetoelectric features are uncovered, establishing CuO as prototype multiferroic with abundance of competitive magnetic interactions.
U2 - 10.1038/ncomms10295
DO - 10.1038/ncomms10295
M3 - Article
VL - 7
JO - Nature Communications
JF - Nature Communications
SN - 2041-1723
M1 - 10295
ER -