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    Van der Waals multiferroic tunnel junction with giant tunneling electroresistance and magnetoresistance toward bidirectional photoresponse and photoassisted memory

    Zhi Yang, Shen-Ao Qin, Bao-Fu Ruan, Jia-Heng Wang, Bing-Xin Liu, Chuan-Kui Wang, Zong-Liang Li*, and Shuai Qiu†

    • Shandong Key Laboratory of Medical Physics and Image Processing & Shandong Provincial Engineering and Technical Center of Light Manipulations, School of Physics and Electronics, Shandong Normal University, Jinan 250358, China

    • *Contact author: lizongliang@sdnu.edu.cn
    • †Contact author: shuaiqiu@sdnu.edu.cn

    Phys. Rev. B 112, 115312 – Published 29 September, 2025

    DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/9m1x-q7dn

    Abstract

    Achieving higher-order multistates with significant tunneling electroresistance (TER) and tunneling magnetoresistance (TMR) in van der Waals (vdW) multiferroic tunnel junction at the nanoscale is essential for multifunctional information storage. Based on first-principles calculations, a strategy is proposed using four-layer vdW heterostructures that ferroelectric (FE) bilayer-Ga2Se3 sandwiched between two half-metal CoGa2Se4 layers. Reversible transition between quasi-Ohmic and Schottky contacts at the interface can be regulated by FE, stemming from the polarization-field-driven band structure shift and multi-interface electron transfer. Accordingly, the designed symmetric Cu/CoGa2Se4/bilayer−Ga2Se3/CoGa2Se4/Cu vdW antiferroelectric multiferroic tunnel junction (AFMFTJ) achieves giant TER and TMR ratios up to 5.43×104% and 1.16×103%, respectively, accompanied by exceptionally low resistance-area product of 0.1Ωµm2. Of note, due to the type-II and degenerate band alignments of bilayer Ga2Se3 controlled by FE-polarized directions, the proposed AFMFTJ exhibits bidirectional photoresponse (R) up to 23.3 and −23.3 mA/W in FE states, while negligible R in antiferroelectric states. As such, the robust and feeble R are suitable for encoding binary digits as “1” and “0”, respectively, enabling the implementation of photoassisted memory and logic functions. Our findings demonstrate the potential photoelectric spintronic applications of AFMFTJ in nanoscale information storage.

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