spin current tagged posts

Researchers from North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill used chiral phonons to convert wasted heat into spin information – without needing magnetic materials. The finding could lead to new classes of less expensive, energy-efficient spintronic devices for use in applications ranging from computational memory to powergrids.

Spintronic devices are electronic devices that harness the spin of an electron, rather than its charge, to create current used for data storage, communication, and computing...

This illustration shows the flow of a magnetic property of electrons known as spin current from a magnetic material (blue), to a nonmagnetic material (red). Credit: SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory

The result, which revealed a surprising loss of current along the way, is an important step toward realizing next-gen “Spintronics”. Spin current is an inherent magnetic property common to all electrons – as it travels across materials. Modern computing relies on the precise control of electric charges that zip around from component to component in labyrinth-like channels in semiconductors. Spintronics could change that by tapping electrons’ spin, with “up” or “down” orientation, rather than their charge.

Finding a way to directly control this up or down property would rule out the need to f...