Interfacial Crystal Hall Effect Reversible by Ferroelectric Polarization
Ding-Fu Shao, Jun Ding, Gautam Gurung, Shu-Hui Zhang, Evgeny Y. Tsymbal
Abstract
The control of spin-dependent properties by voltage, not involving magnetization switching, has significant advantages for low-power spintronics. Here, we predict that the interfacial crystal Hall effect (ICHE) can serve this purpose. We show that the ICHE can occur in heterostructures composed of compensated antiferromagnetic metals and nonmagnetic insulators due to reduced symmetry at the interface, and it can be made reversible if the antiferromagnet is layered symmetrically between two identical ferroelectric layers. We explicitly demonstrate this phenomenon using density-functional-theory calculations for three material systems: ${\mathrm{Mn}\mathrm{Bi}}_{2}{\mathrm{Te}}_{4}/{\mathrm{Ge}\mathrm{I}}_{2}$ and topological ${\mathrm{In}}_{2}{\mathrm{Te}}_{3}/{\mathrm{Mn}\mathrm{Bi}}_{2}{\mathrm{Te}}_{4}/{\mathrm{In}}_{2}{\mathrm{Te}}_{3}$ van der Waals heterostructures and a $\mathrm{Ge}\mathrm{Te}/{\mathrm{Ru}}_{2}\mathrm{Mn}\mathrm{Ge}/\mathrm{Ge}\mathrm{Te}$ heterostructure composed of three-dimensional materials. We show that all three systems reveal a sizable ICHE, while the last two exhibit a quantum ICHE and ICHE, respectively, that are reversible with ferroelectric polarization. Our proposal provides an alternative direction for voltage-controlled spintronics and offers as-yet unexplored possibilities for functional devices by heterostructure design.