Origin of the light-induced spin currents in heavy metal/magnetic insulator bilayers

Hongru Wang; Jing Meng; Jianjun Lin; Bin Xu; Hai Ma; Yucheng Kan; Rui Chen; Lujun Huang; Ye Chen; Fangyu Yue; Chun-Gang Duan; Junhao Chu; Lin Sun

doi:10.1038/s41467-024-48710-6

Nature Communications (May 2024)

Origin of the light-induced spin currents in heavy metal/magnetic insulator bilayers

Hongru Wang,
Jing Meng,
Jianjun Lin,
Bin Xu,
Hai Ma,
Yucheng Kan,
Rui Chen,
Lujun Huang,
Ye Chen,
Fangyu Yue,
Chun-Gang Duan,
Junhao Chu,
Lin Sun

Affiliations

Hongru Wang: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Jing Meng: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Jianjun Lin: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Bin Xu: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Hai Ma: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Yucheng Kan: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Rui Chen: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Lujun Huang: The Extreme Optoelectromechamics Laboratory (XXL), School of Physics and Electronic Science, East China Normal University
Ye Chen: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Fangyu Yue: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Chun-Gang Duan: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Junhao Chu: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University
Lin Sun: Key Laboratory of Polar Materials and Devices (MOE), Department of Electronics, East China Normal University

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-48710-6
Journal volume & issue: Vol. 15, no. 1
pp. 1 – 8

Abstract

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Abstract Light-induced spin currents with the faster response is essential for the more efficient information transmission and processing. Herein, we systematically explore the effect of light illumination energy and direction on the light-induced spin currents in the W/Y3Fe5O12 heterojunction. Light-induced spin currents can be clearly categorized into two types. One is excited by the low light intensity, which mainly involves the photo-generated spin current from spin photovoltaic effect. The other is caused by the high light intensity, which is the light-thermally induced spin current and mainly excited by spin Seebeck effect. Under low light-intensity illumination, light-thermally induced temperature gradient is very small so that spin Seebeck effect can be neglected. Furthermore, the mechanism on spin photovoltaic effect is fully elucidated, where the photo-generated spin current in Y3Fe5O12 mainly originates from the process of spin precession induced by photons. These findings provide some deep insights into the origin of light-induced spin current.

Published in Nature Communications

ISSN: 2041-1723 (Online)
Publisher: Nature Portfolio
Country of publisher: United Kingdom
LCC subjects: Science
Website: https://www.nature.com/ncomms/

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