  Strain-mediated thin film multiferroics comprising
piezoelectric/ferromagnetic heterostructures enable the electrical manipulation
of magnetization with much greater efficiency than other methods; however, the
investigation of nanostructures fabricated from these materials is limited.
Here we characterize ferromagnetic Ni nanostructures grown on a ferroelectric
PMN-PT substrate using scanning electron microscopy with polarization analysis
(SEMPA) and micromagnetic simulations. The magnetization of the Ni
nanostructures can be controlled with a combination of sample geometry and
applied electric field, which strains the ferroelectric substrate and changes
the magnetization via magnetoelastic coupling. We evaluate two types of
simulations of ferromagnetic nanostructures on strained ferroelectric
substrates: conventional micromagnetic simulations including a simple uniaxial
strain, and coupled micromagnetic-elastodynamic simulations. Both simulations
qualitatively capture the response of the magnetization changes produced by the
applied strain, with the coupled solution providing more accurate
representation.
