Juan F. Sierra
In recent years, spin-based technologies, in which information is carried by spin instead of charge, have become promising for “beyond-CMOS” devices. Graphene and other two dimensional materials have rapidly established themselves as intriguing building blocks for spintronics applications [1]. Because of the graphene intrinsic low spin-orbit interaction, spins can flow snugly through its crystal lattice over long distances, resulting in an ideal spin channel. At the same time, the graphene’s low spin-orbit interaction inhibits the manipulation of spins, which is the cornerstone for successfully implementing spin-based devices. Nevertheless, this bottleneck can be overcome by combing graphene with other layered materials in artificial van der Waals heterostructures. In this talk, I will present a set of experiments where we study the spin-relaxation in graphene-transition metal dichalcogenides heterostructures [2]. In such van der Waals systems, spin-orbit coupling in graphene is enhanced by proximity effects. As a consequence, the spin dynamics becomes anisotropic [2, 3], with a spin relaxation that depends on the spin orientation. Furthermore, we demonstrate an efficient spin-charge interconversion driven by the Spin Hall effect and inverse spin galvanic effect at room temperature [4].
1. W. Han et al., Nature Nanotechnology 9, 794 (2014).
2. L. A. Benítez, J. F. Sierra et al., Nature Physics 14, 303 (2018).
3. L. A. Benítez, J. F. Sierra et al., APL Materials 7, 120701 (2019).
4. L. A. Benítez, W. Savero Torres, J. F. Sierra, et al., Nature Materials 19, 170 (2020).