The transport of spin information has been studied in various materials, such as metals, semiconductors and graphene. In these materials, spin is transported by the diffusion of conduction electrons. ...Here we study the diffusion and relaxation of spin in a magnetic insulator, where the large bandgap prohibits the motion of electrons. Spin can still be transported, however, through the diffusion of non-equilibrium magnons, the quanta of spin-wave excitations in magnetically ordered materials. Here we show experimentally that these magnons can be excited and detected fully electrically in a linear response, and can transport spin angular momentum through the magnetic insulator yttrium iron garnet (YIG) over distances as large as 40 μm. We identify two transport regimes: the diffusion-limited regime for distances shorter than the magnon spin diffusion length, and the relaxation-limited regime for larger distances. With a model similar to the diffusion-relaxation model for electron spin transport in (semi)conducting materials, we extract the magnon spin diffusion length λ = 9.4 ± 0.6 μm in a thin 200 nm YIG film at room temperature.
Spin manipulation using electric currents is one of the most promising directions in the field of spintronics. We used neutron scattering to observe the influence of an electric current on the ...magnetic structure in a bulk material. In the skyrmion lattice of manganese silicon, where the spins form a lattice of magnetic vortices similar to the vortex lattice in type II superconductors, we observe the rotation of the diffraction pattern in response to currents that are over five orders of magnitude smaller than those typically applied in experimental studies on current-driven magnetization dynamics in nanostructures. We attribute our observations to an extremely efficient coupling of inhomogeneous spin currents to topologically stable knots in spin structures.
In 1984, Bychkov and Rashba introduced a simple form of spin-orbit coupling to explain the peculiarities of electron spin resonance in two-dimensional semiconductors. Over the past 30 years, Rashba ...spin-orbit coupling has inspired a vast number of predictions, discoveries and innovative concepts far beyond semiconductors. The past decade has been particularly creative, with the realizations of manipulating spin orientation by moving electrons in space, controlling electron trajectories using spin as a steering wheel, and the discovery of new topological classes of materials. This progress has reinvigorated the interest of physicists and materials scientists in the development of inversion asymmetric structures, ranging from layered graphene-like materials to cold atoms. This Review discusses relevant recent and ongoing realizations of Rashba physics in condensed matter.
Efficient manipulation of magnon spin transport is crucial for developing magnon-based spintronic devices. In this Letter, we provide proof of principle of a method for modulating the diffusive ...transport of thermal magnons in an yttrium iron garnet channel between injector and detector contacts. The magnon spin conductance of the channel is altered by increasing or decreasing the magnon chemical potential via spin Hall injection of magnons by a third modulator electrode. We obtain a modulation efficiency of 1.6%/mA at T=250 K. Finite element modeling shows that this could be increased to well above 10%/mA by reducing the thickness of the channel, providing interesting prospects for the development of thermal-magnon-based logic circuits.
We investigate coupled spin and heat transport in easy-plane magnetic insulators. These materials display a continuous phase transition between normal and condensate states that is controlled by an ...external magnetic field. Using hydrodynamic equations supplemented by Gross-Pitaevski phenomenology and magnetoelectric circuit theory, we derive a two-fluid model to describe the dynamics of thermal and condensed magnons, and the appropriate boundary conditions in a hybrid normal-metal-magnetic-insulator-normal-metal heterostructure. We discuss how the emergent spin superfluidity can be experimentally probed via a spin Seebeck effect measurement.
We investigate optically excited terahertz standing spin waves in noncollinear magnetic bilayers. Using femtosecond laser-pulse excitation, a spin current is generated in the first ferromagnetic (FM) ...layer, and flows through a conductive spacer layer to be injected into the second (transverse) FM layer, where it exerts a spin-transfer torque on the magnetization and excites higher-order standing spin waves. We show that the noncollinear magnetic bilayer is a convenient tool that allows easy excitation of terahertz spin waves, and can be used to investigate the dispersion and thereby the spin-wave stiffness parameter in the thin-film regime. This is experimentally demonstrated using wedge-shaped Co and CoB (absorption) layers. Furthermore, the damping of these terahertz spin waves is investigated, showing a strong increase of the damping with decreasing absorption layer thickness, much stronger than expected from interface spin pumping effects. Additionally, a previously unseen sudden decrease in the damping for the thinnest films is observed. A model for the additional damping contribution incorporating both these observations is proposed.
Dzyaloshinskii-Moriya interaction (DMI) is investigated in a 2D ferromagnet (FM) with spin-orbit interaction of Rashba type at finite temperatures. The FM is described in the continuum limit by an ...effective s-d model with arbitrary dependence of spin-orbit coupling (SOC) and kinetic energy of itinerant electrons on the absolute value of momentum. In the limit of weak SOC, we derive a general expression for the DMI constant D from a microscopic analysis of the electronic grand potential. We compare D with the exchange stiffness A and show that, to the leading order in small SOC strength α_{R}, the conventional relation D=(4mα_{R}/ℏ)A, in general, does not hold beyond the Bychkov-Rashba model. Moreover, in this model, both A and D vanish at zero temperature in the metal regime (i.e., when two spin sub-bands are partly occupied). For nonparabolic bands or nonlinear Rashba coupling, these coefficients are finite and acquire a nontrivial dependence on the chemical potential that demonstrates the possibility to control the size and chirality of magnetic textures by adjusting a gate voltage.
Magnonic Black Holes Roldán-Molina, A; Nunez, Alvaro S; Duine, R A
Physical review letters,
2017-Feb-10, Letnik:
118, Številka:
6
Journal Article
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
We show that the interaction between the spin-polarized current and the magnetization dynamics can be used to implement black-hole and white-hole horizons for magnons-the quanta of oscillations in ...the magnetization direction in magnets. We consider three different systems: easy-plane ferromagnetic metals, isotropic antiferromagnetic metals, and easy-plane magnetic insulators. Based on available experimental data, we estimate that the Hawking temperature can be as large as 1 K. We comment on the implications of magnonic horizons for spin-wave scattering and transport experiments, and for magnon entanglement.
Spintronic and nanomagnetic devices often derive their functionality from layers of different materials and the interfaces between them. This is especially true for synthetic antiferromagnets - two ...or more ferromagnetic layers that are separated by metallic spacers or tunnel barriers and which have antiparallel magnetizations. Here, we discuss the new opportunities that arise from synthetic antiferromagnets, as compared to crystal antiferromagnets or ferromagnets.
Magnons in ferromagnets behave as a viscous fluid over a length scale, the momentum-relaxation length, below which momentum-conserving scattering processes dominate. We show theoretically that in ...this hydrodynamic regime viscous effects lead to a sign change in the magnon chemical potential, which can be detected as a sign change in the nonlocal resistance measured in spin transport experiments. This sign change is observable when the injector-detector distance becomes comparable to the momentum-relaxation length. Taking into account momentum- and spin-relaxation processes, we consider the quasiconservation laws for momentum and spin in a magnon fluid. The resulting equations are solved for nonlocal spin transport devices in which spin is injected and detected via metallic leads. Because of the finite viscosity we also find a backflow of magnons close to the injector lead. Our work shows that nonlocal magnon spin transport devices are an attractive platform to develop and study magnon-fluid dynamics.
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