May 2022

Researchers at Cornell University and University of Nebraska have discovered a strategy to switch the magnetization in thin layers of a ferromagnet. This a technique has the potential to lead to the development of more energy-efficient magnetic memory devices.

Scientists have been trying for many years to change the orientation of electron spins in magnetic materials by manipulating them with magnetic fields. But researchers including Dan Ralph, the F.R. Newman Professor of Physics in the College of Arts and Sciences and the paper's senior author, have instead looked to using spin currents carried by electrons, which exist when electrons have spins generally oriented in one direction.

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A team of scientists, led by City College of New York physicist Lia Krusin-Elbaum, has designed a technique that uses ionic hydrogen to reduce charge carrier density in the bulk of three-dimensional (3D) topological insulators and magnets. The result is that robust non-dissipative surface or edge quantum conduction channels can be accessed for manipulation and control.

This approach could open the door to new quantum device platforms for harnessing emergent topological states for nano-spintronics and fault-tolerant quantum computing.

Researchers at Johns Hopkins University, University of Texas at Austin, Northeastern University and Argonne National Laboratory have reported a new quantum phenomenon in antiferromagnetic insulators that could open the door to new ways of powering  spintronic devices.

Antiferromagnetic insulators are advantageous in spintronic applications because of their low stray fields and rapid magnetic dynamics. Controlling their magnetization and reading their magnetic state is critical for these applications, but they are challenging.

Researchers at Columbia University, Brookhaven National Laboratory, University of Washington, Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the National Institute for Materials Science in Japan have found a strong link between electron transport and magnetism in a material called chromium sulfide bromide (CrSBr).

Created in the lab of Columbia University chemist Xavier Roy, CrSBr is a van der Waals crystal that can be peeled back into stackable 2D layers that are just a few atoms thin. In contrast to related materials that are rapidly destroyed by oxygen and water, CrSBr crystals are stable at ambient conditions. These crystals also maintain magnetic properties at a relatively high temperature of -280 F, obviating the need for expensive liquid helium cooled to -450 F.

Scientists from MPI CPfS, in collaboration with colleagues from National Yang Ming Chiao Tung University, National Cheng Kung University, and National Synchrotron Radiation Research Center in Taiwan as well as from Hiroshima University in Japan, have used strained engineering on multiferroic BiFeO₃ (BFO) thin films, to fabricate bistable antiferromagnetic states at room temperature for the first time.

These two antiferromagnetic states are non-volatile and very close to each other in energy, which was verified by soft x-ray linear dichroism spectroscopy. Moreover, these two non-volatile antiferromagnetic states can be reversibly switched by a moderate magnetic field and a non-contact optical approach. The team stressed that the conductivity of the two antiferromagnetic domains is drastically different.