September 2017

Researchers from Russia and Japan have shown, theoretically, that it is possible to create a new class of materials: spin-valley half-metals. These kind of devices could enable both spintronics valleytronics applications.

In "regular" half-metals, all the electrons that participate in electric currents have the same spin - and so the current is always spin-polarized. These materials have interesting applications for spintronics devices. In the new class of materials now proven theoretically to be possible, there are two valleys present - one providing electrons, one providing holes.

Researchers from Singapore's A*STAR and NTU developed a tunable room-temperature platform that can be used to control and detect magnetic skyrmions. This platform is actually a thin film made from multi-layer stacks of Ir/Fe/Co/Pt.

In this material, the magnetic interactions governing skyrmion properties can be controlled by varying the ferromagnetic layer composition. The skyrmions exhibit a smooth crossover between isolated (metastable) and disordered lattice configurations across samples, while their size and density can be tuned by factors of two and ten, respectively.

Reserachers from Spain's CIC nanoGUNE and IKERBASQUE discovered that you can use organic solar panels to created spin-current. The researchers used cobalt and nickel-iron magnetic electrodes to create spin-polarized current from a solar panel made from C60 fullerenes.

The researchers created the device by evaporating the metal and the C60 fullerenes onto a substrate, replacing the usual indium tin oxide and aluminium electrodes.