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A stronger interlayer magnetic coupling (ILMC) can open up new opportunities in spintronics devices for Fe$_5$GeTe$_2$ (F5GT), a demonstrated two-dimensional (2D) van der Waals (vdW) material with high Currie temperature. Here we observe an extraordinary ILMC spike in F5GT, jumping from 1.15 to 12.79 meV/f.u, by applying a 3% in-plane strain. This spike is mainly ascribed to a significant increase in the magnetic moment of the Fe5 ion. Moreover, the applied in-plane strain can also significantly enhance the magnetic anisotropy energy (MAE) of the system, triggering the transition between the in/off-plane configurations in multi-layer F5GT., 25 pages, 9 figures

Electrical gate-manipulated exchange bias (EB) effect is a long-term goal for spintronics applications. Meanwhile, the emergence of van der Waals (vdW) magnetic heterostructures provides ideal platforms for the study of interlayer magnetic coupling. However, to date, the electrical gate-controlled EB effect has yet to be realized in vdW heterostructures. Here, for the first time, we realized electrically-controllable EB effects in a vdW antiferromagnetic (AFM)-ferromagnetic (FM) heterostructure, FePS3-Fe5GeTe2. For pristine FePS3-Fe5GeTe2 heterostructures, sizable EB effects can be generated due to the strong interface coupling, which also depend on the thickness of the ferromagnetic layers. By applying a solid protonic gate, the EB effects can be electrically tuned largely by proton intercalations and deintercalations. The EB field reaches up to 23% of the coercive field and the blocking temperature exceeds 50 K at Vg= -3.15 V. The proton intercalations not only tune the average magnetic exchange coupling, but also change the AFM configurations and transform the heterointerface between an uncompensated AFM-FM interface and a compensated AFM-FM interface. These alterations result in a dramatic modulation of the total interface exchange coupling and the resultant EB effects. The study is a significant step towards vdW heterostructure-based magnetic logic for future low-energy electronics., Comment: 19 pages, 5 figures

The weak interlayer coupling in van der Waals (vdW) magnets has confined their application to two dimensional (2D) spintronic devices. Here, we demonstrate that the interlayer coupling in a vdW magnet Fe$_3$GeTe$_2$ (FGT) can be largely modulated by a protonic gate.With the increase of the protons intercalated among vdW layers,interlayer magnetic coupling increases.Because of the existence of antiferromagnetic layers in FGT nanoflakes, the increasing interlayer magnetic coupling induces exchange bias in protonated FGT nanoflakes. Most strikingly, a rarely seen zero-field cooled (ZFC) exchange bias with very large values (maximally up to 1.2 kOe) has been observed when higher positive voltages (Vg>4.36 V) are applied to the protonic gate, which clearly demonstrates that a strong interlayer coupling is realized by proton intercalation. Such strong interlayer coupling will enable a wider range of applications for vdW magnets., Published on 22 July 2020 in Physical Review Letters