Geometry–Dependent Magnetoelectric and Exchange Bias Effects of the Nano L–T Mode Bar Structure Magnetoelectric Sensor

Abstract

The geometry–dependent magnetoelectric (ME) and exchange bias (EB) effects of the nano ME sensor were investigated. The sensor consisted of the Longitudinal–Transverse (L–T) mode bi–layer bar structure comprising the ferromagnetic (FM) and ferroelectric (FE) materials and the anti–ferromagnetic (AFM) material. The bi–layer ME coefficient was derived from constitutive equations and Newton’s second law. The trade–off between peak ME coefficient and optimal thickness ratio was realized. At the frequency × structure length = 0.1 and 1200, minimum and maximum peak ME coefficients of the Terfenol–D/PZT bi-layer were around 1756 and 5617 mV/Oe·cm, respectively, with 0.43 and 0.19 optimal thickness ratios, respectively. Unfortunately, the bi-layer could not distinguish the opposite magnetic field directions due to their similar output voltages. PtMn and Cr2O3, the AFM, were introduced to produce the EB effect. The simulation results showed the exchange field starting at a minimum PtMn thickness of 6 nm. Nevertheless, Cr2O3 did not induce the exchange field due to its low anisotropy constant. The tri–layer ME sensor consisting of PZT (4.22 nm)/Terfenol–D (18 nm)/PtMn (6 nm) was demonstrated in sensing 2 Tbit/in2 magnetic bits. The average exchange field of 5100 Oe produced the output voltage difference of 12.96 mV, sufficient for most nanoscale magnetic sensing applications.