Experimental investigation of performance of tri-layered magnetoelectric composites under thermal environment

The presence of coupling between electric and magnetic fields attracts various applications for magnetoelectric (ME) materials such as magnetic field sensors, energy harvesting devices, multiferroic motors, etc. ME effects are produced due to transfer of strain through bonding of ferroelectric and ferromagnetic constituent phases. ME effects are significantly affected by various parameters such as the constituent phases, geometry, connectivity schemes, etc. In the present work, a trilayered ME composite is made by sandwiching a ferroelectric material between two ferromagnetic materials at the top and the bottom. ME composites were made by varying the volume fractions of the ferromagnetic material. This work primarily focuses on understanding the temperature dependence of sensing characteristics and coupling factor of ME composites. With this in mind, initially the temperature dependent behavior of individual constituent phases are experimentally investigated. Experimental investigation reveals that the sensing characteristics and coupling factor of ME composites are significantly affected by the operating temperature and the volume fraction of the constituent phases.