Spintronics, or spin electronics, involves the study of active control and manipulation of spin degrees of freedom in solid-state systems. This article reviews the current status of this subject, including both recent advances and well-established results. The primary focus is on the basic physical principles underlying the generation of carrier spin polarization, spin dynamics, and spin-polarized transport in semiconductors and metals. Spin transport differs from charge transport in that spin is a nonconserved quantity in solids due to spin-orbit and hyperfine coupling. The authors discuss in detail spin decoherence mechanisms in metals and semiconductors. Various theories of spin injection and spin-polarized transport are applied to hybrid structures relevant to spin-based devices and fundamental studies of materials properties. Experimental work is reviewed with the emphasis on projected applications, in which external electric and magnetic fields and illumination by light will be used to control spin and charge dynamics to create new functionalities not feasible or ineffective with conventional electronics.

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Spintronics: Fundamentals and applications

Nanocrystals (NCs) discussed in this Review are tiny crystals of metals, semiconductors, and magnetic material consisting of hundreds to a few thousand atoms each. Their size ranges from 2-3 to about 20 nm. What is special about this size regime that placed NCs among the hottest research topics of the last decades? The quantum mechanical coupling * To whom correspondence should be addressed. E-mail: dvtalapin@uchicago.edu. † The University of Chicago. ‡ Argonne National Lab. Chem. Rev. 2010, 110, 389–458 389

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Prospects of Colloidal Nanocrystals for Electronic and Optoelectronic Applications

Ever since its discovery, the Berry phase has permeated through all branches of physics. Over the last three decades, it was gradually realized that the Berry phase of the electronic wave function can have a profound effect on material properties and is responsible for a spectrum of phenomena, such as ferroelectricity, orbital magnetism, various (quantum/anomalous/spin) Hall effects, and quantum charge pumping. This progress is summarized in a pedagogical manner in this review. We start with a brief summary of necessary background, followed by a detailed discussion of the Berry phase effect in a variety of solid state applications. A common thread of the review is the semiclassical formulation of electron dynamics, which is a versatile tool in the study of electron dynamics in the presence of electromagnetic fields and more general perturbations. Finally, we demonstrate a re-quantization method that converts a semiclassical theory to an effective quantum theory. It is clear that the Berry phase should be added as a basic ingredient to our understanding of basic material properties.

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Berry phase effects on electronic properties

Spin currents can apply useful torques in spintronic devices. The spin Hall effect has been proposed as a source of spin current, but its modest strength has limited its usefulness. We report a giant spin Hall effect (SHE) in β-tantalum that generates spin currents intense enough to induce efficient spin-torque switching of ferromagnets at room temperature. We quantify this SHE by three independent methods and demonstrate spin-torque switching of both out-of-plane and in-plane magnetized layers. We furthermore implement a three-terminal device that uses current passing through a tantalum-ferromagnet bilayer to switch a nanomagnet, with a magnetic tunnel junction for read-out. This simple, reliable, and efficient design may eliminate the main obstacles to the development of magnetic memory and nonvolatile spin logic technologies.

Spin-torque switching with the giant spin hall effect of tantalum

In solid-state materials with strong relativistic spin-orbit coupling, charge currents generate transverse spin currents. The associated spin Hall and inverse spin Hall effects distinguish between charge and spin current where electron charge is a conserved quantity but its spin direction is not. This review provides a theoretical and experimental treatment of this subfield of spintronics, beginning with distinct microscopic mechanisms seen in ferromagnets and concluding with a discussion of optical-, transport-, and magnetization-dynamics-based experiments closely linked to the microscopic and phenomenological theories presented.

Spin Hall effects

We propose the phase dynamics induced by spin waves in a superconductor/ferromagnet/superconductor (SC/FM/SC) Josephson junction. The resistively shunted junction (RSJ) model, which describes the dynamics of superconducting phase difference, is extended to include the spin wave excitation by ferromagnetic resonance (FMR) using the gauge invariant phase difference between two s -wave superconductors. The current–voltage characteristics show step structures when the magnetization in FM is driven by tuning the microwave frequency to FMR in the SC/FM/SC junction. The result presents a new route to observe the spin wave excitation using the Josephson effect.

Ferromagnetic Resonance Induced Josephson Current in a Superconductor/Ferromagnet/Superconductor Junction(Condensed matter : electronics structure and electrical, magnetic, and optical properties)

Coupling of Josephson-phase and spin-waves is theoretically studied in a superconductor/ferromagnetic insulator/superconductor (S/FI/S) junction. Electromagnetic (EM) field inside the junction and the Josephson current coupled with spin-waves in FI are calculated by combining Maxwell and Landau–Lifshitz–Gilbert equations. In the S/FI/S junction, it is found that the current–voltage ( I – V ) characteristic shows two resonant peaks for each mode of the EM field. Voltages at the resonant peaks are obtained as a function of the normal modes of EM field, which indicates a composite excitation of the EM field and spin-waves in the S/FI/S junction. We also examine another type of junction, in which a nonmagnetic insulator (I) is located at one of interfaces between S and FI. In such a S/I/FI/S junction, three resonant peaks appear in the I – V curve, since the Josephson-phase couples to the EM field in the I layer.

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Composite Excitation of Josephson Phase and Spin Waves in Josephson Junctions with Ferromagnetic Insulator

It is shown that when a spin-polarized current is injected into a superconductor from a ferromagnet in ferromagnet/superconductor (FM/SC) and FM/SC/FM tunnel junctions, the spin and charge degrees of freedom of electrons are carried by quasi-particles and Cooper pairs in SC, respectively. The spin accumulation competes with the superconductivity and the spin current gives rise to the transverse charge current in SC.

http://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/0022-3727/35/19/321/pdf

Spin injection into superconductors

Nonlocal spin Hall effect and spin–orbit interaction in nonmagnetic metals

Coupling of Josephson-phase and spin-waves is theoretically studied in a superconductor/ferromagnetic insulator/superconductor (S/FI/S) junction. Electromagnetic (EM) field inside the junction and the Josephson current coupled with spin-waves in FI are calculated by combining Maxwell and Landau-Lifshitz-Gilbert equations. In the S/FI/S junction, it is found that the current-voltage (I-V) characteristic shows two resonant peaks. Voltages at the resonant peaks are obtained as a function of the normal modes of EM field, which indicates a composite excitation of the EM field and spin-waves in the S/FI/S junction. We also examine another type of junction, in which a nonmagnetic insulator (I) is located at one of interfaces between S and FI. In such a S/I/FI/S junction, three resonant peaks appear in the I-V curve, since the Josephson-phase couples to the EM field in the I layer.

Saburo Takahashi

Papers

Ferromagnetic Resonance Induced Josephson Current in a Superconductor/Ferromagnet/Superconductor Junction(Condensed matter : electronics structure and electrical, magnetic, and optical properties)

Composite Excitation of Josephson Phase and Spin Waves in Josephson Junctions with Ferromagnetic Insulator

Spin injection into superconductors

Nonlocal spin Hall effect and spin–orbit interaction in nonmagnetic metals

Composite excitation of Josephson phase and spin waves in Josephson junctions with ferromagnetic insulator