George E. Valley, Jr. Prize Talk: Picoscale Engineering of Oxide Quantum Materials

Materials systems with many strongly interacting degrees of freedom can host some of the most exotic physical states known. In thin films, the interface between two distinct quantum materials forms a further playground to engineer emergent ground states. Here we demonstrate how we can combine atomically-precise thin film synthesis with picoscale imaging of the resulting structure, to design, construct and probe novel quantum materials at the sub-Angstrom length scales. We will consider a series of complex oxide superlattices where tuning the local distortions of the lattice can lead to dramatic changes in the electronic and magnetic properties of the system. We will demonstrate how this technical approach allows us to stabilize previously metastable “hidden” ground states to construct the first room-temperature strong multiferroic material and a high energy density antiferroelectric system.