Coupling between ferromagnetic and ferroelastic transitions and ordering in Heusler alloys produces new multifunctionality

The ability of Heusler alloys to accommodate broad variations of composition, doping and ordering provides multiple options for tailoring their ferromagnetic and ferroelastic properties. Moreover, existing coupling between these ferroic properties ranging from coupled ferroic transitions to a coupling of their ferromagnetic and ferroelastic microstructure allows for manifold multifunctionalities. Here we focus on ferromagnetic, metamagnetic and reentrant shape memory alloys explaining the principles and sketch effects’ rich susceptibility to temperature, magnetic field and stress. We illustrate how these can provide a path to a multitude of emerging applications for actuation, sensing, and energy use. As an outlook, we discuss time dependency, fatigue, and finite size effects, which are not yet fully explored.