Strain-Mediated Control of Magnetic Properties in Thin Films

Magnetic thin films underpin modern data storage, sensing, and on-chip microwave technologies, and reconfiguration of their magnetic properties plays a vital role. Emerging low-power, tightly integrated architectures motivate complementary control modalities with minimal thermal overhead. Strain offers a low-dissipation route for magnetic control because lattice deformation can modify exchange interactions and spin-orbit-coupled anisotropy without requiring sustained charge transport. We summarize magnetoelastic coupling, piezomagnetism, and flexomagnetism and then compare strain delivery from piezoelectric substrate to epitaxial mismatch, flexible substrate engineering, and surface acoustic waves. We mainly focus on tunable outputs of ordering temperatures, magnetization and reversal, anisotropy and resonance dynamics, and domain structures, with additional concern on spin-orbit torques and altermagnetism, aiming to provide design guidelines for next-generation low-power spintronic and magnetoelectronic devices.