35 research outputs found
Magnetism, symmetry and spin transport in van der Waals layered systems
The discovery of an ever-increasing family of atomic layered magnetic materials, together with the already established vast catalogue of strong spin–orbit coupling and topological systems, calls for some guiding principles to tailor and optimize novel spin transport and optical properties at their interfaces. Here, we focus on the latest developments in both fields that have brought them closer together and make them ripe for future fruitful synergy. After outlining fundamentals on van der Waals magnetism and spin–orbit coupling effects, we discuss how their coexistence, manipulation and competition could ultimately establish new ways to engineer robust spin textures and drive the generation and dynamics of spin current and magnetization switching in 2D-materials-based van der Waals heterostructures. Grounding our analysis on existing experimental results and theoretical considerations, we draw a prospective analysis about how intertwined magnetism and spin–orbit torque phenomena combine at interfaces with well-defined symmetries and how this dictates the nature and figures of merit of spin–orbit torque and angular momentum transfer. This will serve as a guiding role in designing future non-volatile memory devices that utilize the unique properties of 2D materials with the spin degree of freedom
Magnetism, symmetry and spin transport in van der Waals layered systems
The discovery of an ever increasing family of atomic layered magnetic
materials, together with the already established vast catalogue of strong
spin-orbit coupling (SOC) and topological systems, calls for some guiding
principles to tailor and optimize novel spin transport and optical properties
at their interfaces. Here we focus on the latest developments in both fields
that have brought them closer together and make them ripe for future fruitful
synergy. After outlining fundamentals on van der Waals (vdW) magnetism and SOC
effects, we discuss how their coexistence, manipulation and competition could
ultimately establish new ways to engineer robust spin textures and drive the
generation and dynamics of spin current and magnetization switching in 2D
materials-based vdW heterostructures. Grounding our analysis on existing
experimental results and theoretical considerations, we draw a prospective
analysis about how intertwined magnetism and spin-orbit torque (SOT) phenomena
combine at interfaces with well-defined symmetries, and how this dictates the
nature and figures-of-merit of SOT and angular momentum transfer. This will
serve as a guiding role in designing future non-volatile memory devices that
utilize the unique properties of 2D materials with the spin degree of freedom.Comment: 26 pages, 5 figures, 1 table and 1 textbo
Magnonic Charge Pumping via Spin-Orbit Coupling
The interplay between spin, charge, and orbital degrees of freedom has led to
the development of spintronic devices like spin-torque oscillators, spin-logic
devices, and spin-transfer torque magnetic random-access memories. In this
development spin pumping, the process where pure spin-currents are generated
from magnetisation precession, has proved to be a powerful method for probing
spin physics and magnetisation dynamics. The effect originates from direct
conversion of low energy quantised spin-waves in the magnet, known as magnons,
into a flow of spins from the precessing magnet to adjacent normal metal leads.
The spin-pumping phenomenon represents a convenient way to electrically detect
magnetisation dynamics, however, precessing magnets have been limited so far to
pump pure spin currents, which require a secondary spin-charge conversion
element such as heavy metals with large spin Hall angle or multi-layer layouts
to be detectable. Here, we report the experimental observation of charge
pumping in which a precessing ferromagnet pumps a charge current, demonstrating
direct conversion of magnons into high-frequency currents via the relativistic
spin-orbit interaction. The generated electric current, differently from spin
currents generated by spin-pumping, can be directly detected without the need
of any additional spin to charge conversion mechanism and amplitude and phase
information about the relativistic current-driven magnetisation dynamics. The
charge-pumping phenomenon is generic and gives a deeper understanding of the
recently observed spin-orbit torques, of which it is the reciprocal effect and
which currently attract interest for their potential in manipulating magnetic
information. Furthermore, charge pumping provides a novel link between
magnetism and electricity and may find application in sourcing alternating
electric currents.Comment: 3 figure
Perspective on unconventional computing using magnetic skyrmions
Learning and pattern recognition inevitably requires memory of previous
events, a feature that conventional CMOS hardware needs to artificially
simulate. Dynamical systems naturally provide the memory, complexity, and
nonlinearity needed for a plethora of different unconventional computing
approaches. In this perspective article, we focus on the unconventional
computing concept of reservoir computing and provide an overview of key
physical reservoir works reported. We focus on the promising platform of
magnetic structures and, in particular, skyrmions, which potentially allow for
low-power applications. Moreover, we discuss skyrmion-based implementations of
Brownian computing, which has recently been combined with reservoir computing.
This computing paradigm leverages the thermal fluctuations present in many
skyrmion systems. Finally, we provide an outlook on the most important
challenges in this field.Comment: 19 pages and 3 figure
Nonlinear magnon polaritons
We experimentally and theoretically demonstrate that nonlinear spin-wave
interactions suppress the hybrid magnon-photon quasiparticle or "magnon
polariton" in microwave spectra of an yttrium iron garnet film detected by an
on-chip split-ring resonator. We observe a strong coupling between the Kittel
and microwave cavity modes in terms of an avoided crossing as a function of
magnetic fields at low microwave input powers, but a complete closing of the
gap at high powers. The experimental results are well explained by a
theoretical model including the three-magnon decay of the Kittel magnon into
spin waves. The gap closure originates from the saturation of the ferromagnetic
resonance above the Suhl instability threshold by a coherent back reaction from
the spin waves.Comment: 6 page
Laser-induced topological spin switching in a 2D van der Waals magnet
Two-dimensional (2D) van der Waals (vdW) magnets represent one of the most
promising horizons for energy-efficient spintronic applications because their
broad range of electronic, magnetic and topological properties. Of particular
interest is the control of the magnetic properties of 2D materials by
femtosecond laser pulses which can provide a real path for low-power
consumption device platforms in data storage industries. However, little is
known about the interplay between light and spin properties in vdW layers.
Here, combining large-scale spin dynamics simulations including biquadratic
exchange interactions and wide-field Kerr microscopy (WFKM), we show that
ultrafast laser excitation can not only generate different type of spin
textures in CrGeTe vdW magnets but also induce a reversible transformation
between them in a toggle-switch mechanism. Our calculations show that
skyrmions, anti-skyrmions, skyrmioniums and stripe domains can be generated via
high-intense laser pulses within the picosecond regime. The effect is tunable
with the laser energy where different spin behaviours can be selected, such as
fast demagnetisation process (250 fs) important for information
technologies. The phase transformation between the different topological spin
textures is obtained as additional laser pulses are applied to the system where
the polarisation and final state of the spins can be controlled by external
magnetic fields. We experimentally confirmed the creation, manipulation and
toggle switching phenomena in CrGeTe due to the unique aspect of
laser-induced heating of electrons. Our results indicate laser-driven spin
textures on 2D magnets as a pathway towards ultrafast reconfigurable
architecture at the atomistic level
Reconfigurable Training and Reservoir Computing in an Artificial Spin-Vortex Ice via Spin-Wave Fingerprinting
Strongly-interacting artificial spin systems are moving beyond mimicking
naturally-occurring materials to emerge as versatile functional platforms, from
reconfigurable magnonics to neuromorphic computing. Typically artificial spin
systems comprise nanomagnets with a single magnetisation texture: collinear
macrospins or chiral vortices. By tuning nanoarray dimensions we achieve
macrospin/vortex bistability and demonstrate a four-state metamaterial
spin-system 'Artificial Spin-Vortex Ice' (ASVI). ASVI can host Ising-like
macrospins with strong ice-like vertex interactions, and weakly-coupled
vortices with low stray dipolar-field. Vortices and macrospins exhibit
starkly-differing spin-wave spectra with analogue-style mode-amplitude control
and mode-frequency shifts of df = 3.8 GHz.
The enhanced bi-textural microstate space gives rise to emergent physical
memory phenomena, with ratchet-like vortex training and history-dependent
nonlinear fading memory when driven through global field cycles. We employ
spin-wave microstate fingerprinting for rapid, scaleable readout of vortex and
macrospin populations and leverage this for spin-wave reservoir computation.
ASVI performs linear and non-linear mapping transformations of diverse input
signals as well as chaotic time-series forecasting. Energy costs of machine
learning are spiralling unsustainably, developing low-energy neuromorphic
computation hardware such as ASVI is crucial to achieving a zero-carbon
computational future
Spin-orbit coupling suppression and singlet-state blocking of spin-triplet Cooper pairs
An inhomogeneous magnetic exchange field at a superconductor/ferromagnet interface converts spin-singlet Cooper pairs to a spin-aligned (i.e. spin-polarized) triplet state. Although the decay envelope of such triplet pairs within ferromagnetic materials is well studied, little is known about their decay in non-magnetic metals and superconductors, and in particular in the presence of spin-orbit coupling (SOC). Here we investigate devices in which triplet supercurrents are injected into the s-wave superconductor Nb. In the normal state of Nb, triplet supercurrents decay over a distance of 5 nm, which is an order of magnitude smaller than the decay of spin singlet pairs due to the SOC interacting with the spin associated with triplet pairs. In the superconducting state of Nb, triplet supercurrents are not able to couple with the singlet wavefunction and thus blocked by the absence of available equilibrium states in the singlet gap. The results offer new insight into the dynamics between s-wave singlet and s-wave triplet states.S.K., J.M.D-S., G.Y., X.M., L.F.C., H.K., M.G.B., and J.W.A.R. acknowledge funding from the EPSRC Programme Grant “Superspin” (no. EP/N017242/1) and EPSRC International Network Grant “Oxide Superspin” (no. EP/P026311/1). K.O. acknowledges the JSPS Programme “Fostering Globally Talented Researchers” (JPMXS05R2900005). S.M. and A.I.B. acknowledge funding from Russian Science Foundation (grant no. 20-12-00053, in part related to the theoretical calculations). Zh.D. and S.M. acknowledge financial support from the Foundation for the advancement of theoretical physics “BASIS.” S.M. acknowledges financial support from the Russian Presidential Scholarship (SP-3938.2018.5