Research efforts addressing spin waves (magnons) in micro- and nanostructured ferromagnetic materials have increased tremendously in recent years. Corresponding experimental and theoretical work in magnonics faces significant challenges in that spin-wave dispersion relations are highly anisotropic and different magnetic states might be realized via, for example, the magnetic field history. At the same time, these features offer novel opportunities for wave control in solids going beyond photonics and plasmonics. In this topical review we address materials with a periodic modulation of magnetic parameters that give rise to artificially tailored band structures and allow unprecedented control of spin waves. In particular, we discuss recent achievements and perspectives of reconfigurable magnonic devices for which band structures can be reprogrammed during operation. Such characteristics might be useful for multifunctional microwave and logic devices operating over a broad frequency regime on either the macro- or nanoscale.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0953-8984/26/12/123202/pdf

Review and prospects of magnonic crystals and devices with reprogrammable band structure

We experimentally investigate and quantitatively analyze the spin Hall magnetoresistance effect in ferromagnetic insulator/platinum and ferromagnetic insulator/nonferromagnetic metal/platinum hybrid structures. For the ferromagnetic insulator, we use either yttrium iron garnet, nickel ferrite, or magnetite and for the nonferromagnet, copper or gold. The spin Hall magnetoresistance effect is theoretically ascribed to the combined action of spin Hall and inverse spin Hall effect in the platinum metal top layer. It therefore should characteristically depend upon the orientation of the magnetization in the adjacent ferromagnet and prevail even if an additional, nonferromagnetic metal layer is inserted between Pt and the ferromagnet. Our experimental data corroborate these theoretical conjectures. Using the spin Hall magnetoresistance theory to analyze our data, we extract the spin Hall angle and the spin diffusion length in platinum. For a spin-mixing conductance of 4×1014 ??1m?2, we obtain a spin Hall angle of 0.11±0.08 and a spin diffusion length of (1.5±0.5) nm for Pt in our thin-film samples

/pdf/quantitative-study-of-the-spin-hall-magnetoresistance-in-2ukri59g3o.pdf

Quantitative study of the spin Hall magnetoresistance in ferromagnetic insulator/normal metal hybrids

https://escholarship.org/content/qt1xm794rm/qt1xm794rm.pdf?t=p2njav

Skyrmions in magnetic multilayers

The spin Seebeck effect refers to the generation of a spin voltage caused by a temperature gradient in a ferromagnet, which enables the thermal injection of spin currents from the ferromagnet into an attached nonmagnetic metal over a macroscopic scale of several millimeters. The inverse spin Hall effect converts the injected spin current into a transverse charge voltage, thereby producing electromotive force as in the conventional charge Seebeck device. Recent theoretical and experimental efforts have shown that the magnon and phonon degrees of freedom play crucial roles in the spin Seebeck effect. In this article, we present the theoretical basis for understanding the spin Seebeck effect and briefly discuss other thermal spin effects.

Theory of the Spin Seebeck Effect

The spin Seebeck effect refers to the generation of a spin voltage caused by a temperature gradient in a ferromagnet, which enables the thermal injection of spin currents from the ferromagnet into an attached nonmagnetic metal over a macroscopic scale of several millimeters. The inverse spin Hall effect converts the injected spin current into a transverse charge voltage, thereby producing electromotive force as in the conventional charge Seebeck device. Recent theoretical and experimental efforts have shown that the magnon and phonon degrees of freedom play crucial roles in the spin Seebeck effect. In this paper, we present the theoretical basis for understanding the spin Seebeck effect and briefly discuss other thermal spin effects.

https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0034-4885/76/3/036501/pdf

Theory of the spin Seebeck effect.

Growth of nm-thick yttrium iron garnet films and ferromagnetic resonance (FMR) linewidth properties in the films are reported. The films were grown on gadolinium gallium garnet substrates by pulsed laser deposition (PLD). Films in the 5–35 nm thickness range showed a (111) orientation and a surface roughness between 0.1 and 0.3 nm. The 10 nm films showed a 10 GHz FMR linewidth of about 6 Oe and a damping constant of 3.2 × 10−4. The FMR linewidth increases with both the surface roughness and the surface Fe deficiency. Thicker films exhibit a smaller FMR linewidth and a lower damping constant.

Growth and ferromagnetic resonance properties of nanometer-thick yttrium iron garnet films

Strong damping enhancement in nm-thick yttrium iron garnet (YIG) films due to Pt capping layers was observed. This damping is substantially larger than the expected damping due to conventional spin pumping, is accompanied by a shift in the ferromagnetic resonance field, and can be suppressed by the use of a Cu spacer in between the YIG and Pt films. The data indicate that such damping may originate from the ferromagnetic ordering in Pt atomic layers near the $\mathrm{YIG}/\mathrm{Pt}$ interface and the dynamic exchange coupling between the ordered Pt spins and the spins in the YIG film.

Damping in yttrium iron garnet nanoscale films capped by platinum.

Relaxation control in magnetic thin films via thermally induced interfacial spin transfers was demonstrated for the first time. The experiments used a trilayered structure that consisted of an yttrium iron garnet (YIG) thin film grown on a gadolinium gallium garnet substrate and capped with a nanometer-thick Pt layer. As a temperature gradient is applied across the thickness of the structure, there exists a spin angular momentum transfer across the $\mathrm{YIG}/\mathrm{Pt}$ interface. This spin transfer results in a torque on YIG magnetic moments. The torque can either speed up or slow down the relaxation in the YIG film, depending on the sign of the temperature gradient with respect to the trilayered structure.

/pdf/control-of-ferromagnetic-relaxation-in-magnetic-thin-films-5frkdhxzll.pdf

Michael Jantz

Papers

Growth and ferromagnetic resonance properties of nanometer-thick yttrium iron garnet films

Damping in yttrium iron garnet nanoscale films capped by platinum.

Control of ferromagnetic relaxation in magnetic thin films through thermally induced interfacial spin transfer.