Organic Donor-Acceptor Cocrystals for Multiferroic Applications

The cocrystallization strategy has provided an efficient route to fulfill room temperature magnetoelectricity in single phase owing to the long-range ordered π-π stacking (donor-acceptor assembled) network, long-lived excitons (with μs lifetime), spin orders (±1/2 s pin) and charge transfer (CT) dipoles in the assembled crystal lattice. Together with the superiorities in cost-effectiveness, easy tailoring, light weight, mechanical flexibility and large-scale integration of organic materials, research direction on organic CT multiferroics has become a rising star. In this minireview, we present the recent progress in the fundamental understanding and designing of multiferroics and highlight the advance of organic CT compounds in exploring the magnetoelectronic (ME) coupling effect ranging from experimental to theoretical investigations. Moreover, the challenges existing in this area are also put forward as well as some perspectives for the future development.