In recent years, spin-orbit effects have been widely used to produce and detect spin currents in spintronic devices. The peculiar symmetry of the spin Hall effect allows creation of a spin ...accumulation at the interface between a metal with strong spin-orbit interaction and a magnetic insulator, which can lead to a net pure spin current flowing from the metal into the insulator. This spin current applies a torque on the magnetization, which can eventually be driven into steady motion. Tailoring this experiment on extended films has proven to be elusive, probably due to mode competition. This requires the reduction of both the thickness and lateral size to reach full damping compensation. Here we show clear evidence of coherent spin-orbit torque-induced auto-oscillation in micron-sized yttrium iron garnet discs of thickness 20 nm. Our results emphasize the key role of quasi-degenerate spin-wave modes, which increase the threshold current.
It is demonstrated that the threshold current for damping compensation can be reached in a 5 μm diameter YIG(20 nm)|Pt(7 nm) disk. The demonstration rests upon the measurement of the ferromagnetic ...resonance linewidth as a function of I(dc) using a magnetic resonance force microscope (MRFM). It is shown that the magnetic losses of spin-wave modes existing in the magnetic insulator can be reduced or enhanced by at least a factor of 5 depending on the polarity and intensity of an in-plane dc current I(dc) flowing through the adjacent normal metal with strong spin-orbit interaction. Complete compensation of the damping of the fundamental mode by spin-orbit torque is reached for a current density of ∼3×10(11) A·m(-2), in agreement with theoretical predictions. At this critical threshold the MRFM detects a small change of static magnetization, a behavior consistent with the onset of an auto-oscillation regime.
We report on a comparative study of spin Hall related effects and magnetoresistance in YIGPt and YIGTa bilayers. These combined measurements allow to estimate the characteristic transport parameters ...of both Pt and Ta layers juxtaposed to yttrium iron garnet (YIG): the spin mixing conductance G sub(arrowuparrowdown) at the YIGnormal metal interface, the spin Hall angle Theta sub(SH), and the spin diffusion length in the normal metal. The inverse spin Hall voltages generated in Pt and Ta by the pure spin current pumped from YIG excited at resonance confirm the opposite signs of spin Hall angles in these two materials. Moreover from the dependence of the inverse spin Hall voltage on the Ta mechanical properties defect spin diffusion length in Ta, found to be (ProQuest: Formulae and/or non-USASCII text omitted) = 1.8 + or - 0.7 nm. Both the YIGPT and YIGTa systems display a similar variation of resistance upon magnetic field orientation, which can be explained in the recently developed framework of spin Hall magnetoresistance.
Strongly out-of-equilibrium regimes in magnetic nanostructures exhibit novel properties, linked to the nonlinear nature of magnetization dynamics, which are of great fundamental and practical ...interest. Here, we demonstrate that ferromagnetic resonance driven by microwave magnetic fields can occur with substantial spatial coherency at an unprecedented large angle of magnetization precessions, which is normally prevented by the onset of spin-wave instabilities and magnetization turbulent dynamics. Our results show that this limitation can be overcome in nanomagnets, where the geometric confinement drastically reduces the density of spin-wave modes. When the obtained deeply nonlinear ferromagnetic resonance regime is perturbed, the magnetization undergoes eigenoscillations around the steady state due to torques tending to restore the stable large-angle periodic trajectory. These eigenoscillations are substantially different from the usual spin-wave modes around the ground state because their existence is connected to the presence of a large coherent precession. They are experimentally investigated by a new spectroscopic technique based on the application of a second microwave excitation field that is tuned to resonantly drive them. This two-tone spectroscopy enables us to show that they consist in slow coherent magnetization nutations around the large-angle steady precession, whose frequencies are set by the balance of restoring torques. Our experimental findings are well accounted for by an analytical model derived for systems with uniaxial symmetry. They also provide a new means for controlling highly nonlinear magnetization dynamics in nanostructures, opening interesting applicative opportunities in the context of magnetic nanotechnologies.
We study the collective dynamics of two distant magnets coherently coupled by acoustic phonons that are transmitted through a nonmagnetic spacer. By tuning the ferromagnetic resonances of the two ...magnets to an acoustic resonance of the intermediate, we control a coherent three-level system. We show that the parity of the phonon mode governs the indirect coupling between the magnets: the resonances with odd (even) phonon modes correspond to out-of-phase (in-phase) lattice displacements at the interfaces, leading to bright (dark) states in response to uniform microwave magnetic fields, respectively. The experimental sample is a trilayer garnet consisting of two thin magnetic films epitaxially grown on both sides of a half-millimeter-thick nonmagnetic single crystal. In spite of the relatively weak magnetoelastic interaction, the long lifetimes of the magnon and phonon modes are the key to unveil strong coupling over a macroscopic distance, establishing the value of garnets as a platform to study multipartite hybridization processes at microwave frequencies.
We report ferromagnetic resonance in the normal configuration of an electrically insulating magnetic bilayer consisting of two yttrium iron garnet (YIG) films epitaxially grown on both sides of a ...0.5-mm-thick nonmagnetic gadolinium gallium garnet (GGG) slab. An interference pattern is observed and it is explained as the strong coupling of the magnetization dynamics of the two YIG layers either in phase or out of phase by the standing transverse sound waves, which are excited through a magnetoelastic interaction. This coherent mediation of angular momentum by circularly polarized phonons through a nonmagnetic material over macroscopic distances can be useful for future information technologies.
We demonstrate ultra-fast (down to 400 ps) bipolar magnetization switching of a three-terminal perpendicular Ta/FeCoB/MgO/FeCoB magnetic tunnel junction. The critical current density rises ...significantly as the current pulse shortens below 10 ns, which translates into a minimum in the write energy in the nanosecond range. Our results show that spin-orbit torque-MRAM allows for fast and low-power write operations, which makes it promising for non-volatile cache memory applications.
We report on the electrical detection of the dynamical part of the spin-pumping current emitted during ferromagnetic resonance using inverse spin Hall effect methods. The experiment is performed on a ...YIG|Pt bilayer. The choice of yttrium iron garnet (YIG), a magnetic insulator, ensures that no charge current flows between the two layers and only the pure spin current produced by the magnetization dynamics is transferred into the adjacent strong spin-orbit Pt layer via spin pumping. To avoid measuring the parasitic eddy currents induced at the frequency of the microwave source, a resonance at half the frequency is induced using parametric excitation in the parallel geometry. Triggering this nonlinear effect allows us to directly detect on a spectrum analyzer the microwave component of the inverse spin Hall effect voltage. Signals as large as 30 μV are measured for precession angles of a couple of degrees. This direct detection provides a novel efficient means to study magnetization dynamics on a very wide frequency range with great sensitivity.
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