Sergey Dushenko

Experimental demonstration of room-temperature spin transport in n-type Germanium epilayers

We report an experimental demonstration of room-temperature spin transport in n-type Ge epilayers grown on a Si(001) substrate. By utilizing spin pumping under ferromagnetic resonance, which inherently endows a spin battery function for semiconductors connected with a ferromagnet, a pure spin current is generated in the n-Ge at room temperature. The pure spin current is detected by using the inverse spin-Hall effect of either a Pt or Pd electrode on n-Ge. From a theoretical model that includes a geometrical contribution, the spin diffusion length in n-Ge at room temperature is estimated to be 660 nm. Moreover, the spin relaxation time decreases with increasing temperature, in agreement with a recently proposed theory of donor-driven spin relaxation in multivalley semiconductors.

Gate-Tunable Spin-Charge Conversion and the Role of Spin-Orbit Interaction in Graphene

The small spin-orbit interaction of carbon atoms in graphene promises a long spin diffusion length and the potential to create a spin field-effect transistor. However, for this reason, graphene was largely overlooked as a possible spin-charge conversion material. We report electric gate tuning of the spin-charge conversion voltage signal in single-layer graphene. Using spin pumping from an yttrium iron garnet ferrimagnetic insulator and ionic liquid top gate, we determined that the inverse spin Hall effect is the dominant spin-charge conversion mechanism in single-layer graphene. From the gate dependence of the electromotive force we showed the dominance of the intrinsic over Rashba spin-orbit interaction, a long-standing question in graphene research.

Quantitative investigation of the inverse Rashba-Edelstein effect in Bi/Ag and Ag/Bi on YIG

The inverse Rashba-Edelstein effect (IREE) is a spin conversion mechanism that recently attracts attention in spintronics and condensed matter physics. In this letter, we report an investigation of the IREE in Bi/Ag by using ferrimagnetic insulator yttrium iron garnet. We prepared two types of samples with opposite directions of the Rashba field by changing a stacking order of Bi and Ag. An electric current generated by the IREE was observed from both stacks, and an efficiency of spin conversion—characterized by the IREE length—was estimated by taking into account a number of contributions left out in previous studies. This study provides a further insight into the IREE spin conversion mechanism: important step towards achieving efficient spin-charge conversion devices.

Ferromagnetic resonance and spin pumping efficiency for inverse spin-Hall effect normalization in yttrium-iron-garnet-based systems

The inverse spin Hall effect has made its way from being a peculiar phenomenon predicted and discovered in semiconductors more than 30 years ago to being an extremely important effect in modern spintronics. It allows for the detection and conversion of spin current, along with the probing of the spin–orbit interaction of materials. However, the discrepancy between theoretical and experimental results has slowed down the progress of this branch of spintronics and its applications. In this study, we analyzed yttrium-iron-garnet-based systems highly exploited in spin pumping experiments and demonstrated the correct normalization procedure for the inverse spin Hall effect in such systems.

Temperature dependence of exchange bias in Co/FeMn-structure induced by heating and cooling in magnetic field

Using the method of angular dependence of ferromagnetic resonance field the magnetic properties of Si/SiO2/Cu/Co/FeMn/Cu and Si/SiO2/Cu/Co/Cu/FeMn/Cu structures were investigated. The layer deposition was carried out by magnetron sputtering in absence of an external magnetic field. It was established that thermal annealing with further cooling down in presence of a magnetic field can generate an exchange bias at anneal temperature significantly below the bulk antiferromagnetic Neel temperature. It was also shown that a thin interlayer between ferromagnetic and antiferromagnetic layers reduces the exchange bias effect at low anneal temperatures, however, makes this effect more stable at high annealing temperatures.

Significant reduction in spin pumping efficiency in a platinum/yttrium iron garnet bilayer at low temperature

The temperature evolution of a direct-current electromotive force (EMF) generated by spin pumping and the inverse-spin Hall effect in a platinum (Pt)/yttrium iron garnet (YIG) bilayer was investigated down to 80 K. The magnitude of the EMF decreased significantly with decreasing temperature and disappeared at approximately 80 K. 40-nm-thick YIG films fabricated by a metal organic decomposition method exhibited single-peak ferrimagnetic resonance (FMR) spectra without any spin wave resonance, which allowed us to precisely analyze the FMR spectra. We determined that the temperature evolution of the Gilbert damping constant is the dominant factor in the temperature dependence of the EMF. The comparison of the FMR linewidth between the X- and Q-bands revealed that an increase in Gilbert damping constant at low temperatures is not due to the enhancement of the spin pumping efficiency but due to an additional spin relaxation in the YIG film itself, which reduces the precession angle of the magnetization under the FMR conditions.

The dependence of magnetic properties of Co/FeMn bilayer structure on the magnitude of magnetic field applied during the layer deposition

By measuring the angular dependence of ferromagnetic resonance field at room and low temperatures, it is demonstrated that the magnitude of magnetic field applied during magnetron deposition of Ta/Co/FeMn/Ta structures influences their magnetic properties such as uniaxial and unidirectional anisotropy, magnetization and the exchange bias blocking temperature. The deposition field effects on the bilayer structure are compared with the effects on a similar structure, but without antiferromagnetic layer. The exchange bias blocking temperature of investigated structures is found to be significantly lower than the Neel temperature of a bulk antiferromagnet. The origin of the observed effects is shortly discussed.

Tunable inverse spin Hall effect in nanometer-thick platinum films by ionic gating

Electric gating can strongly modulate a wide variety of physical properties in semiconductors and insulators, such as significant changes of conductivity in silicon, appearance of superconductivity in SrTiO3, the paramagnet–ferromagnet transition in (In,Mn)As, and so on. The key to such modulation is charge accumulation in solids. Thus, it has been believed that such modulation is out of reach for conventional metals where the number of carriers is too large. However, success in tuning the Curie temperature of ultrathin cobalt gave hope of finally achieving such a degree of control even in metallic materials. Here, we show reversible modulation of up to two orders of magnitude of the inverse spin Hall effect—a phenomenon that governs interconversion between spin and charge currents—in ultrathin platinum. Spin-to-charge conversion enables the generation and use of electric and spin currents in the same device, which is crucial for the future of spintronics and electronics.The ability to electrically control spintronic materials significantly widens their potential for integration into devices, but it is difficult to achieve in metals with high carrier densities. Here the authors demonstrate ionic liquid gated control of the inverse spin Hall effect in platinum.

Spin-orbit coupling induced by bismuth doping in silicon thin films

We demonstrate an enhancement of the spin-orbit coupling in silicon (Si) thin films by doping with bismuth (Bi), a heavy metal, using ion implantation. Quantum corrections to conductance at low temperature in phosphorous-doped Si before and after Bi implantation is measured to probe the increase of the spin-orbit coupling, and a clear modification of magnetoconductance signals is observed: Bi doping changes magnetoconductance from weak localization to the crossover between weak localization and weak antilocalization. The elastic diffusion length, phase coherence length and spin-orbit coupling length in Si with and without Bi implantation are estimated, and the spin-orbit coupling length after the Bi doping becomes the same order of magnitude (Lso = 54 nm) with the phase coherence length (L{\phi} = 35 nm) at 2 K. This is an experimental proof that the spin-orbit coupling strength in Si thin film is tunable by doping with heavy metals.This study demonstrates an enhancement of spin-orbit coupling in silicon (Si) thin films by doping with bismuth (Bi), a heavy metal, using ion implantation. Quantum corrections to conductance at low temperatures in phosphorous-doped Si before and after Bi implantation are measured to probe the increase in spin-orbit coupling, and a clear modification of magnetoconductance signals is observed: Bi doping changes magnetoconductance from weak localization to the crossover between weak localization and weak antilocalization. The elastic diffusion length, phase coherence length, and spin-orbit coupling length in Si with and without Bi implantation are estimated, and the spin-orbit coupling length after Bi doping becomes the same order of magnitude (Lso = 54 nm) with the phase coherence length (Lφ = 35 nm) at 2 K. This is an experimental proof that spin-orbit coupling strength in the thin Si film is tunable by doping with heavy metals.This study demonstrates an enhancement of spin-orbit coupling in silicon (Si) thin films by doping with bismuth (Bi), a heavy metal, using ion implantation. Quantum corrections to conductance at low temperatures in phosphorous-doped Si before and after Bi implantation are measured to probe the increase in spin-orbit coupling, and a clear modification of magnetoconductance signals is observed: Bi doping changes magnetoconductance from weak localization to the crossover between weak localization and weak antilocalization. The elastic diffusion length, phase coherence length, and spin-orbit coupling length in Si with and without Bi implantation are estimated, and the spin-orbit coupling length after Bi doping becomes the same order of magnitude (Lso = 54 nm) with the phase coherence length (Lφ = 35 nm) at 2 K. This is an experimental proof that spin-orbit coupling strength in the thin Si film is tunable by doping with heavy metals.We demonstrate an enhancement of the spin-orbit coupling in silicon (Si) thin films by doping with bismuth (Bi), a heavy metal, using ion implantation. Quantum corrections to conductance at low temperature in phosphorous-doped Si before and after Bi implantation is measured to probe the increase of the spin-orbit coupling, and a clear modification of magnetoconductance signals is observed: Bi doping changes magnetoconductance from weak localization to the crossover between weak localization and weak antilocalization. The elastic diffusion length, phase coherence length and spin-orbit coupling length in Si with and without Bi implantation are estimated, and the spin-orbit coupling length after the Bi doping becomes the same order of magnitude (Lso = 54 nm) with the phase coherence length (L{\phi} = 35 nm) at 2 K. This is an experimental proof that the spin-orbit coupling strength in Si thin film is tunable by doping with heavy metals.

Spin-wave-induced lateral temperature gradient in a YIG thin film/GGG system excited in an ESR cavity

The lateral thermal gradient of an yttrium iron garnet (YIG) film under microwave application in the cavity of the electron spin resonance system (ESR) was measured at room temperature by fabricating a Cu/Sb thermocouple onto it. To date, thermal transport in YIG films caused by the Damon-Eshbach mode (DEM)—the unidirectional spin-wave heat conveyer effect—was demonstrated only by the excitation using coplanar waveguides. Here, we show that the effect exists even under YIG excitation using the ESR cavity—a tool often employed to realize spin pumping. The temperature difference observed around the ferromagnetic resonance field under 4 mW microwave power peaked at 13 mK. The observed thermoelectric signal indicates the imbalance of the population between the DEMs that propagate near the top and bottom surfaces of the YIG film. We attribute the DEM population imbalance to different magnetic dampings near the top and bottom YIG surfaces. Additionally, the spin wave dynamics of the system were investigated using the micromagnetic simulations. The micromagnetic simulations confirmed the existence of the DEM imbalance in the system with increased Gilbert damping at one of the YIG interfaces. The reported results are indispensable to the quantitative estimation of the electromotive force in the spin-charge conversion experiments using ESR cavities.The lateral thermal gradient of an yttrium iron garnet (YIG) film under microwave application in the cavity of the electron spin resonance system (ESR) was measured at room temperature by fabricating a Cu/Sb thermocouple onto it. To date, thermal transport in YIG films caused by the Damon-Eshbach mode (DEM)—the unidirectional spin-wave heat conveyer effect—was demonstrated only by the excitation using coplanar waveguides. Here, we show that the effect exists even under YIG excitation using the ESR cavity—a tool often employed to realize spin pumping. The temperature difference observed around the ferromagnetic resonance field under 4 mW microwave power peaked at 13 mK. The observed thermoelectric signal indicates the imbalance of the population between the DEMs that propagate near the top and bottom surfaces of the YIG film. We attribute the DEM population imbalance to different magnetic dampings near the top and bottom YIG surfaces. Additionally, the spin wave dynamics of the system were investigated usi...