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Strain-induced magnetic domain morphology in Pt/CoFeB/Ir multilayers on BaTiO3(001)

Robbie G. Hunt1,*, Khulaif Alshammari1,2,*, Mannan Ali1, Paul S. Keatley3, and Thomas A. Moore1,†

  • 1School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Leeds, Leeds LS2 9JT, United Kingdom
  • 2Physics Department, College of Science, Jouf University, P. O. Box 2014, Sakaka 42421, Saudi Arabia
  • 3Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of Exeter, Stocker Road, Exeter EX4 4QL, United Kingdom

  • *These authors contributed equally to this work.
  • †Contact author: t.a.moore@leeds.ac.uk
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Phys. Rev. B 113, 014412 – Published 12 January, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/zqxt-k522

Abstract

Strain exerted by a ferroelectric substrate on a thin ferromagnetic multilayer film with an interfacial Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction is a promising method of manipulating chiral magnetic spin textures. Here, we report on the strain coupling between magnetic domains in a Pt/CoFeB/Ir multilayer and ferroelectric domains in a BaTiO3(001) substrate. Using wide-field Kerr microscopy to image the demagnetized domain pattern, at room temperature (RT), we observe magnetic stripe domains aligned with the underlying ferroelectric domain pattern. Cooling to 13 K and subsequently warming back up to RT, there are irreversible changes to the ferroelectric domain pattern associated with structural phase transitions, and we find that magnetic stripe domains reorient to match the new ferroelectric domain structure in each phase. These results open a route to electric field manipulation of the domain morphology and chiral spin textures in thin multilayer films.

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Phys. Rev. B 113, 014412– Published 12 January, 2026
  • Received 5 August 2025
  • Revised 29 October 2025
  • Accepted 19 December 2025
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Published by the American Physical Society under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International license. Further distribution of this work must maintain attribution to the author(s) and the published article's title, journal citation, and DOI.

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