Researchers from NYU and IBM Research have created a spintronics device from a ferromagnetic conductor and discovered that current flow in the conductor can produce a spin polarization that is in a direction set by its magnetic moment.
This discovery means that magnetic moment direction can be set in just about any desired direction to then set the spin polarization - this is not possible using the contours of the spin Hall effect in non-magnetic heavy metals.
The researchers also discovered that these polarized spins travel outside the ferromagnetic layer and lead to a pure spin currentâa spin current with no associated electrical currentâin an adjacent non-magnetic metal. This phenomenon has the potential to enable a new generation of spin-controlled memory device for higher-density and more efficient memory technology.