2018/05/17 by Mark S. Senn, Senn, Mark S., Nicholas C. Bristowe +1 · 3 citations
Materials Science · #FOS: Physical sciences #Ferroelectric and Piezoelectric Materials #Magnetic and transport properties of perovskites and related materials #Materials Science (cond-mat.mtrl-sci) #Multiferroics and related materials #Strongly Correlated Electrons (cond-mat.str-el)
paper · pdf · doi:10.48550/arxiv.1805.06671
openalex publication_date 2018/05/17 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
We use a group theoretical approach to enumerate the possible couplings\nbetween magnetism and ferroelectric polarisation in the parent Pm\3m\nperovskite structure. We show that third order magnetoelectric coupling terms\nmust always involve magnetic ordering at the A and B-site which either\ntransforms both as R-point or both as X-point time odd irreducible\nrepresentations (irreps). For fourth order couplings we demonstrate that this\ncriterion may be relaxed allowing couplings involving irreps at X, M and\nR-points which collectively conserve crystal momentum, producing a\nmagnetoelectric effect arising from only B-site magnetic order. In this case,\nexactly two of the three irreps entering the order parameter must be time-odd\nirreps and either one or all must be even with respect to inversion symmetry.\nWe are able to show that the time-even irreps in this triad must transform as\none of: X1-, M3,5- and R5+, corresponding to A-site\ncation order, A-site anti-polar displacements or anion rock-salt ordering. This\ngreatly reduces the search-space for (type-II multiferroic) perovskites. We use\nsimilar arguments to demonstrate how weak ferromagnetism may be engineered, and\nwe propose a variety of schemes for coupling this to ferroelectric\npolarisation. We illustrate our approach with DFT calculations on\nmagnetoelectric couplings, and by considering the literature we suggest which\navenues of research are likely to be most promising in the design of novel\nmagnetoelectric materials.\n