The November 2018 issue of Materials Research Bulletin journal will feature five articles written by distinguished researchers, organized by Professor Gregory Carman and Professor Nian Sun. The articles discuss the control of magnetism and are designed to encourage more research on magnetoelectrics, highlighting the potential of this research to impact society by efficiently controlling magnetism in the small scale. 

Research recently published by Dr. Roberto Lo Conte, postdoctoral researcher under Professor Jeffrey Bokor at the UC Berkeley Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science was featured online by Advances in Engineering (AIE).  The paper published in Nano Letters titled "Influence of Nonuniform Micron-Scale Strain Distributions on the Electrical Reorientation of Magnetic Microstructures in a Composite Multiferroic Heterostructure" was identified by AIE selection committee as a key scientific article contributing to excellence in science and engineering research.Composite multiferroic systems, consisting of a piezoelectric substrate coupled with a ferromagnetic thin film, are of great interest from a technological point of view because they offer a path toward the development of ultralow power magnetoelectric devices. The key aspect of those systems is the possibility to control magnetization via an electric field, relying on the magneto-elastic coupling at the interface between the piezoelectric and the ferromagnetic components. Accordingly, a direct measurement of both the electrically induced magnetic behavior and of the piezo-strain driving such behavior is crucial for better understanding and further developing these materials systems. In this work, we measure and characterize the micron-scale strain and magnetic response, as a function of an applied electric field, in a composite multiferroic system composed of 1 and 2 μm squares of Ni fabricated on a prepoled [Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O3]0.69–[PbTiO3]0.31 (PMN–PT) single crystal substrate by X-ray microdiffraction and X-ray photoemission electron microscopy, respectively. These two complementary measurements of the same area on the sample indicate the presence of a nonuniform strain which strongly influences the reorientation of the magnetic state within identical Ni microstructures along the surface of the sample. Micromagnetic simulations confirm these experimental observations. This study emphasizes the critical importance of surface and interface engineering on the micron-scale in composite multiferroic structures and introduces a robust method to characterize future devices on these length scales.

TANMS graduate student, Zhuyun "Maggie" Xiao, has been named a recipient of the highly coveted Advanced Light Source (ALS) Doctoral Fellowship in Residence for 2018-19. This internationally recognized fellowship is awarded to only 8-10 students each year. During her fellowship year, Maggie will be working at the ALS, a division of Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory (LBNL). LBNL is a national user facility that generates intense x-ray radiation for scientific and technological research. Students acquire hands-on scientific training and develop professional maturity to complement their doctoral research. Maggie will be hosted by Dr. Elke Arenholz, Senior Scientist and Deputy of Photon Science Operations and will continue to work on TANMS-related research. 

TANMS doctoral student, Sidhant Tiwari, has received the Best Student Paper Award in the Sensor and Transducers group at the 2018 IEEE International Frequency Control Symposium held in Olympic Valley, CA. His presented work, "Frequency Doubling in Wirelessly Actuated Multiferroic MEMS Cantilevers" demonstrates how nonlinear multiferroic coupling can be used to measure multiferroic antennas without noise, the first ever demonstration of this technique. 

TANMS is proud to recognize TANMS Graduate Student, Qianchang Wang, for winning Best Poster Award at the 2018 IEEE International Magnetics Conference in Signapore. Qianchang is a fourth year Ph.D. candidate under Professor Gregory Carman in the UCLA Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering. Her research focuses on modeling multiferroic systems coupled with spin-orbit torque using finite element method, with applications in magnetic memory and logic.  This work numerically demonstrates the ultra energy efficiency of multiferroic control of a nanoscale magnetic memory bit. The energy consumption is as low as 22 aJ per flip for a Terfenol-D disk, which is 3-4 orders more energy efficient than current-based control mechanisms. 

TANMS is proud to announce that Stephen Sasaki, doctoral student from UCLA Chemistry and Biochemistry department has placed second in the 2017 National NSF ERC Perfect Pitch Competition with his pitch titled "Wireless Lab on a Microchip: A Continuous Clinical Grade Health Monitoring Implant".