  Spintronic devices currently rely on magnetic switching or controlled motion
of domain walls by an external magnetic field or spin-polarized current.
Achieving the same degree of magnetic controllability using an electric field
has potential advantages including enhanced functionality and low power
consumption. Here, we report on an approach to electrically control local
magnetic properties, including the writing and erasure of regular ferromagnetic
domain patterns and the motion of magnetic domain walls, in multiferroic
CoFe-BaTiO3 heterostructures. Our method is based on recurrent strain transfer
from ferroelastic domains in ferroelectric media to continuous magnetostrictive
films with negligible magnetocrystalline anisotropy. Optical polarization
microscopy of both ferromagnetic and ferroelectric domain structures reveals
that domain correlations and strong inter-ferroic domain wall pinning persist
in an applied electric field. This leads to an unprecedented electric
controllability over the ferromagnetic microstructure, an accomplishment that
produces giant magnetoelectric coupling effects and opens the way to
multiferroic spintronic devices.
