Dresden 2026 – scientific programme
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FM: Fachverband Funktionsmaterialien
FM 8: Multiferroics and Magnetoelectric Coupling (joint session MA/FM)
FM 8.6: Talk
Tuesday, March 10, 2026, 10:45–11:00, POT/0112
Electric control of antiferromagnetic states in an insulator — •Somnath Ghara1, Maximilian Winkler1, Sebastian Schmid1,2, Lilian Prodan1, Korbinian Geirhos1, Vladimir Tsurkan1,3, Wenbo Ge4, Weida Wu4, András Halbritter2, Stephan Krohns1, and István Kézsmárki1 — 1EP5, Institute of Physics, University of Augsburg, Germany — 2Department of Physics, Budapest University of Technology and Economics, Hungary — 3Institute of Applied Physics, Moldova State University, Republic of Moldova — 4Department of Physics and Astronomy, Rutgers University, USA
Electric control of antiferromagnetic (AFM) order is highly desirable for the development of ultrafast and energy-efficient spintronic devices. In this talk, I will show that the strong linear magnetoelectric coupling in the collinear AFM insulator Co3O4 enables full isothermal control of AFM order by electric fields deep within its AFM phase, i.e. the Néel vector can be either reversed instantaneously or rotated smoothly. Importantly, we found that even in macroscopic volumes of Co3O4, the non-volatile switching between time-reversed AFM states occurs on timescales as short as a few tens of nanoseconds. These observations suggest that the quasi-cubic AFM insulators, such as Co3O4, provide an ideal platform for ultrafast manipulation of microscopic AFM domains and may lead to the realization of antiferromagnet-based spintronic devices.
Ref: S. Ghara et al., Phys. Rev. Lett. 135, 126704 (2025).
Keywords: Magnetoelectric; Antiferromagnet; Oxide; Insulator