spintronics tagged posts

Moderate heating up to 80 °Celsius tilts the magnetic moment associated to a single bit into the plane. Upon cooling to room temperature, the magnetic moment stays in plane, until it is overwritten by a magnetic writing head. Credit: HZB

It paves the way to fast and energy efficient ultrahigh density data storage. Scientists have examined thin films of Dysprosium-Cobalt sputtered onto a nanostructured membrane at BESSY II. New patterns of magnetization could be written in a quick and easy manner after warming the sample to only 80C, which is a much lower temperature as compared to conventional Heat Assisted Magnetic Recording systems.

To increase data density further in storage media, materials systems with stable magnetic domains on the nanoscale are needed...

An ORNL-led research team used neutrons (depicted as spheres) to determine the magnetic structure (seen as blue arrows) of an osmium-based material. X-rays (seen as purple waves) revealed the presence of a strong spin orbit effect (illustrated in red). Credit: ORNL/Jill Hemman

An elusive massless particle could exist in a magnetic crystal structure, revealed by neutron and X-ray research. The team studied a material containing the dense element osmium and documented 2 conditions required for the presence of Weyl fermions -predicted in 1929 and observed experimentally in 2015. Researchers are looking for other materials that could host them to harness their unique properties in spintronics and advanced computing applications such as quantum computers.

“Once you have a material that hosts th...

Fig.1: Crystal structure of (Ga,Mn)As. Mn ions substituted for Ga have a magnetic moment, and the magnetic moment of each Mn ion aligns along the same direction when (Ga,Mn)As becomes a ferromagnet. Credit: Seigo Souma

A research group at Tohoku University’s WPI-AIMR has succeeded in finding the origin and the mechanism of ferromagnetism in Mn-doped GaAs. The discovery is significant as it will accelerate the development of the spintronic element. GaAs, like silicon, is a well-known semiconductor commonly used in high-speed electronic devices and laser diodes.

When manganese (Mn) atoms are doped into a GaAs crystal ((Ga,Mn)As), the crystal exhibits characteristics and properties of both the semiconductor and magnet...

The illustration depicts the characteristic spin orientation (arrows) of electrons in a topological insulator (below). Using an initial circular polarised laser pulse, the spins are excited and point up or down. This can be proven by a second linearly polarised laser pulse (above). Credit: HZB

Scientists have shown how spin-polarized currents can be initiated in a controlled manner within samples of topological insulator material. In addition, they were able to manipulate the orientation of the spins of these currents. They thereby demonstrated that this class of materials is suitable for data processing based on spin.

Future information technologies should employ considerably less energy for processing data via topological insulators (with electrons at the surface being extremely mobile, ...