January 2013

Hiroshi Katayama-Yoshida from Osaka University gave a special presentation titled "computational nano-materials Design for spintronics: design vs. realization". In his talk Hiroshi discusses Spinodal Nanotechnology (NT) as a new class of bottom-up NT, the design of high-solubility and ferromagnetism in IV-VI semiconductors, Spintronics device applications using 2D spinodal nano-decomposition and water-splitting and artificial photosynthesis by visible light using spinodal nano-decomposition.

This presentation was given at Keio University's Semiconductor-Spintronics workshop which took place on January 24.

Masaaki Tanaka from the University of Tokyo gave a presentation about Fe-based n-type ferromagnetic semiconductors (In,Fe)As and heterostructures.

This presentation was given at Keio University's Semiconductor-Spintronics workshop which took place on January 24. 

Researchers from the Japanese RIKEN institute have shown that spin information in some materials can travel much further than previously thought. The researchers managed to measure the spin diffusion in detail by using two magnetic contacts to inject the spin signal into a thin silver wire. This enhances the amount of spin polarization present in the wire. Using a third contact that picks the signals, they were manage to manage the polarization degree at several distances along the wire.

They say that spin current was detected at distances of over ten micrometers. The absolute magnitude of the spin signal decreases with travel distance, but the quality of the spin precession signal (coherence) is actually improved - due to the fact that the collective coherent precession of the spins has a beneficial effect on the overall spin polarization over time.

Hideo Ohno from Tohoku University's center for spintronics integrated systems gave a special presentation titled "recent topics in diluted magnetic semiconductors". In his talk, Hideo gives an introduction to ferromagnetic (III,Mn)As and then discusses manipulation by electric-field and materials systems other than (III,Mn)As.

This presentation was given at Keio University's Semiconductor-Spintronics workshop which took place on January 24.

The Semiconductor Research Corporation, and the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has awarded a $28 million five-year grant to open the Center for Spintronic Materials, Interfaces, and Novel Architectures, or C-SPIN. This is a multi-university and industry research center that aims to develop technologies for spin-based computing and memory systems. C-SPIN's research areas include perpendicular magnetic materials, spin channel materials (including topological insulators, monolayer MoS2 and graphene), spintronic interface engineering, spin devices and interconnects and spintronic circuits and architectures.

University partners include the University of Minnesota-Twin Cities, Carnegie Mellon University, Cornell University, MIT, Johns Hopkins University and the University of California, Riverside. Industry partners include IBM, Applied materials, Intel, Texas Instruments and Micron.

Researchers are suggesting a new application for Spintronics - a highly efficient and direct conversion of magnetic energy to electric voltage by using magnetic nanostructures and manipulating the dynamics of magnetization. This conversion could be the foundation for future development of spin-based power electronics. The researchers call this "power spintronics".

Using an experimental model, it was found that a power spintronics-based device may one day be a promising approach to obtaining alternating current (AC) voltages from direct current (DC) magnetic fields. The researchers demonstrated for the first time the feasibility of a device that generates a voltage based on manipulating an effective magnetic field within a nanowire that arises from width modulation.