Interlayer coupling-dependent magnetoelastic response in synthetic antiferromagnets

In recent years, antiferromagnetic materials have been attracting increasing interest for their stability in high magnetic fields and ultrafast magnetization dynamics. Since the energy scale of an interlayer exchange coupling (IEC) in a synthetic antiferromagnet (SAF) consisting of ferromagnetic/nonmagnetic/ferromagnetic multilayers is relatively smaller than that of an exchange coupling in antiferromagnetic materials, magnetic ordering of a SAF can be potentially controlled by an electric field, which is promising for energy-saving spintronic memory devices. However, an electric field-induced magnetoelastic response of SAFs on ferroelectric materials has not been sufficiently understood due to the presence of IEC that complicates magnetization dynamics. In this study, we prepare Co/Ru/Co SAFs with various amplitude of IEC on ferroelectric Pb(Mg1/3Nb2/3)O-3-PbTiO3 substrates and systematically investigate their electric field-induced magnetoelastic response. We demonstrate that the magnetoelastic response disappears at the boundary where a switching between the antiferromagnetic and ferromagnetic IEC coupling occurs. The result provides insight into the coupling of the magnetoelastic effect and IEC and is useful in designing spintronic memory devices based on SAFs.