Engineering Multiferroism in CaMnO3

Structural instabilities of CaMnO3 are investigated from first principles. We point out that, on top of a strong antiferrodistortive instability responsible for its orthorhombic ground state, the cubic perovskite structure of CaMnO3 also exhibits a weak ferroelectric instability. Although ferroelectricity is suppressed by antiferrodistortive motions, we show that it can be favored using strain or chemical engineering in order to make CaMnO3 multiferroic. We finally highlight that the ferroelectric instability of CaMnO3 is Mn-dominated. This illustrates that, contrary to common belief, ferroelectricity and magnetism are not necessarily exclusive but can be driven by the same cation.