Controlling bimerons as skyrmion analogues by ferroelectric polarization in 2D van der Waals multiferroic heterostructures

Atom-thick van der Waals heterostructures with nontrivial physical properties tunable via the magnetoelectric coupling effect are highly desirable for the future advance of multiferroic devices. In this work on LaCl/In2Se3 heterostructure consisting of a 2D ferromagnetic layer and a 2D ferroelectric layer, reversible switch of the easy axis and the Curie temperature of the magnetic LaCl layer has been enabled by switching of ferroelectric polarization in In2Se3. More importantly, magnetic skyrmions in the bimerons form have been discovered in the LaCl/In2Se3 heterostructure and can be driven by an electric current. The creation and annihilation of bimerons in LaCl magnetic nanodisks were achieved by polarization switching. It thus proves to be a feasible approach to achieve purely electric control of skyrmions in 2D van der Waals heterostructures. Such nonvolatile and tunable magnetic skyrmions are promising candidates for information carriers in future data storage and logic devices operated under small electrical currents. Electrical control of topological spin textures is a major goal of spintronics. Here, the authors combine LaCl, a ferromagnet, and In2Se3, a ferroelectric, to create a multiferroic heterostructure, where bimerons, a topological spin-texture, can be created and annihilated by ferroelectric switching.