Journal Article
Advances in Condensed Matter Physics, vol. 2015, pp. 1-9, 2015
Authors
Tamas Varga, Timothy C. Droubay, Mark E. Bowden, Libor Kovarik, Dehong Hu, Scott A. Chambers
Abstract
Polarization-induced weak ferromagnetism has been predicted a few years back in perovskite MTiO3(M = Fe, Mn, and Ni). We set out to stabilize this metastable perovskite structure by growing NiTiO3epitaxially on different substrates and to investigate the dependence of polar and magnetic properties on strain. Epitaxial NiTiO3films were deposited on Al2O3, Fe2O3, and LiNbO3substrates by pulsed laser deposition and characterized using several techniques. The effect of substrate choice on lattice strain, film structure, and physical properties was investigated. Our structural data from X-ray diffraction and electron microscopy shows that substrate-induced strain has a marked effect on the structure and crystalline quality of the films. Physical property measurements reveal a dependence of the weak ferromagnetism and lattice polarization on strain and highlight our ability to control the ferroic properties in NiTiO3thin films by the choice of substrate. Our results are also consistent with the theoretical prediction that the ferromagnetism in acentric NiTiO3is polarization induced. From the substrates studied here, the perovskite substrate LiNbO3proved to be the most promising one for strong multiferroism.
