Prospect for antiferromagnetic spintronics

Exploiting both spin and charge of the electron in electronic micordevices has lead to a tremendous progress in both basic condensed-matter research and microelectronic applications, resulting in the modern field of spintronics. Current spintronics relies primarily on ferromagnets while antiferromagnets have traditionally played only a supporting role. Recently, antiferromagnets have been revisited as potential candidates for the key active elements in spintronic devices. In this paper we review approaches that have been employed for reading, writing, and storing information in antiferromagnets

Resistance spikes and domain wall loops in Ising quantum Hall ferromagnets

We explain the recent observation of resistance spikes and hysteretic transport properties in Ising quantum Hall ferromagnets in terms of the unique physics of their domain walls. Self-consistent RPA/Hartree-Fock theory is applied to microscopically determine properties of the ground state and domain-wall excitations. In these systems domain wall loops support one-dimensional electron systems with an effective mass comparable to the bare electron mass and may carry charge. Our theory is able to account quantitatively for the experimental Ising critical temperature and to explain characteristics of the resistive hysteresis loops.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

In-Plane Magnetic Field Induced Anisotropy of 2D Fermi Contours and the Field Dependent Cyclotron Mass

The electronic structure of a 2D gas subjected to a tilted magnetic field, with a strong component parallel to the GaAs/AlGaAs interface and a weak component oriented perpendicularly, is studied theoretically. It is shown that the parallel field component modifies the originally circular shape of a Fermi contour while the perpendicular component drive an electron by the Lorentz force along a Fermi line with a cyclotron frequency given by its shape. The corresponding cyclotron effective mass is calculated self-consistently for several concentrations of 2D carriers as a function of the in-plane magnetic field. The possibility to detect its field-induced deviations from the zero field value experimentally is discussed.Comment: written in LaTeX, 9 pages, 4 figures (6 pages) in 1 PS file (compressed and uuencoded) available on request from [email protected], SM-JU-93-

Effect of inversion asymmetry on the intrinsic anomalous Hall effect in ferromagnetic (Ga,Mn)As

The relativistic nature of the electron motion underlies the intrinsic part of the anomalous Hall effect, believed to dominate in ferromagnetic (Ga,Mn)As. In this paper, we concentrate on the crystal band structure as an important facet to the description of this phenomenon. Using different k.p and tight-binding computational schemes, we capture the strong effect of the bulk inversion asymmetry on the Berry curvature and the anomalous Hall conductivity. At the same time, we find it not to affect other important characteristics of (Ga,Mn)As, namely the Curie temperature and uniaxial anisotropy fields. Our results extend the established theories of the anomalous Hall effect in ferromagnetic semiconductors and shed new light on its puzzling nature

Manifestation of the spin-Hall effect through transport measurements in the mesoscopic regime

We study theoretically the manifestation of the spin-Hall effect in a two-dimensional electronic system with Rashba spin-orbit coupling via dc-transport measurements in realistic mesoscopic H-shape structures. The Landauer-Buttiker formalism is used to model samples with mobilities and Rashba coupling strengths of current experiments and to demonstrate the appearance of a measurable Rashba-coupling dependent voltage. This type of measurement requires only metal contacts, i.e., no magnetic elements are present. We also confirm the robustness of the intrinsic spin-Hall effect against disorder in the mesoscopic metallic regime in agreement with results of exact diagonalization studies in the bulk.Comment: 5 pages, 3 figure

Charge Hall effect driven by spin-dependent chemical potential gradients and Onsager relations in mesoscopic systems

We study theoretically the spin-Hall effect as well as its reciprocal phenomenon (a transverse charge current driven by a spin-dependent chemical potential gradient) in electron and hole finite size mesoscopic systems. The Landauer-Buttiker-Keldysh formalism is used to model samples with mobilities and Rashba coupling strengths which are experimentally accessible and to demonstrate the appearance of measurable charge currents induced by the spin-dependent chemical potential gradient in the reciprocal spin-Hall effect. We also demonstrate that within the mesoscopic coherent transport regime the Onsager relations are fulfilled for the disorder averaged conductances for electron and hole mesoscopic systems.Comment: 5 pages, 6 figures, typos correcte

Landau Level Anticrossing Manifestations in the Phase Diagram Topology of a Two Subband System

In a two-subband GaAs/AlGaAs two-dimensional electron system, the phase diagram of longitudinal resistivity \rho_xx in density and magnetic field plane exhibits an intriguing structure centered at filling factor \nu = 4 which is strikingly different from the ring-like structures at lower magnetic fields. Thermal activation measurements reveal an anticrossing gap on each boundary of the structure where intersubband Landau Levels with parallel or antiparallel spin are brought into degeneracy. While the physics of the anticrossing can be ascribed to the pseudospin quantum Hall ferromagnetism, as reported earlier by Muraki et al, the mapping and modeling of the phase diagram topology allow us to establish a more complete picture of the consequences of real spin / pseudo-spin interactions for the two subband system.Comment: Accepted by Physical Review

Writing and Reading antiferromagnetic Mn2_2Au: N\'eel spin-orbit torques and large anisotropic magnetoresistance

Antiferromagnets are magnetically ordered materials which exhibit no net moment and thus are insensitive to magnetic fields. Antiferromagnetic spintronics aims to take advantage of this insensitivity for enhanced stability, while at the same time active manipulation up to the natural THz dynamic speeds of antiferromagnets is possible, thus combining exceptional storage density and ultra-fast switching. However, the active manipulation and read-out of the N\'eel vector (staggered moment) orientation is challenging. Recent predictions have opened up a path based on a new spin-orbit torque, which couples directly to the N\'eel order parameter. This N\'eel spin-orbit torque was first experimentally demonstrated in a pioneering work using semimetallic CuMnAs. Here we demonstrate for Mn$_2$Au, a good conductor with a high ordering temperature suitable for applications, reliable and reproducible switching using current pulses and readout by magnetoresistance measurements. The symmetry of the torques agrees with theoretical predictions and a large read-out magnetoresistance effect of more than $\simeq 6$~$\%$ is reproduced by ab initio transport calculations.Comment: 5 pages, 4 figure

High antiferromagnetic domain wall velocity induced by Néel spin-orbit torques

We demonstrate the possibility to drive an antiferromagnetic domain wall at high velocities by fieldlike Néel spin-orbit torques. Such torques arise from current-induced local fields that alternate their orientation on each sublattice of the antiferromagnet and whose orientation depends primarily on the current direction, giving them their fieldlike character. The domain wall velocities that can be achieved by this mechanism are 2 orders of magnitude greater than the ones in ferromagnets. This arises from the efficiency of the staggered spin-orbit fields to couple to the order parameter and from the exchange-enhanced phenomena in antiferromagnetic texture dynamics, which leads to a low domain wall effective mass and the absence of a Walker breakdown limit. In addition, because of its nature, the staggered spin-orbit field can lift the degeneracy between two 180° rotated states in a collinear antiferromagnet, and it provides a force that can move such walls and control the switching of the states