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Tunable room-temperature spin galvanic and spin Hall effects in van der Waals heterostructures

Nature Materials volume 19, pages 170–175 (2020)Cite this article

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Abstract

Spin–orbit coupling stands as a powerful tool to interconvert charge and spin currents and to manipulate the magnetization of magnetic materials through spin-torque phenomena. However, despite the diversity of existing bulk materials and the recent advent of interfacial and low-dimensional effects, control of this interconversion at room temperature remains elusive. Here, we demonstrate strongly enhanced room-temperature spin-to-charge interconversion in graphene driven by the proximity of WS2. By performing spin precession experiments in appropriately designed Hall bars, we separate the contributions of the spin Hall and the spin galvanic effects. Remarkably, their corresponding conversion efficiencies can be tailored by electrostatic gating in magnitude and sign, peaking near the charge neutrality point with an equivalent magnitude that is comparable to the largest efficiencies reported to date. Such electric-field tunability provides a building block for spin generation free from magnetic materials and for ultra-compact magnetic memory technologies.

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Fig. 1: SCI in graphene by proximity of a TMDC and measurement scheme.
Fig. 2: Sample characterization and spin-to-charge conversion measurements.
Fig. 3: Gate control of the ISHE and SGE at room temperature.
Fig. 4: Temperature dependence of the spin-to-charge conversion associated with the SHE.

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Data availability

The data that support the plots within this paper and the other findings of this study are available from the corresponding authors on reasonable request.

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Acknowledgements

We thank D. Torres for help in designing Fig. 1. This research was partially supported by the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme Graphene Flagship CORE 2, under grant agreement no. 785219; by the European Research Council under grant agreement no. 306652 SPINBOUND; by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness, MINECO (under contract nos FIS2015-62641-ERC, MAT2016-75952-R and SEV-2017-0706 Severo Ochoa); and by the CERCA Programme and the Secretariat for Universities and Research, Knowledge Department of the Generalitat de Catalunya 2017 SGR 827. M.T. acknowledges support from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under the Marie Sklodowska-Curie grant agreement no. 665919.

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Author notes

  1. These authors contributed equally: L. Antonio Benítez, Williams Savero Torres.

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (ICN2), CSIC and The Barcelona Institute of Science and Technology (BIST), Campus UAB, Bellaterra, Spain

    L. Antonio Benítez, Williams Savero Torres, Juan F. Sierra, Matias Timmermans, Jose H. Garcia, Stephan Roche, Marius V. Costache & Sergio O. Valenzuela

  2. Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona, Bellaterra, Spain

    L. Antonio Benítez & Matias Timmermans

  3. Institució Catalana de Recerca i Estudis Avançats (ICREA), Barcelona, Spain

    Stephan Roche & Sergio O. Valenzuela

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  1. L. Antonio Benítez
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Contributions

L.A.B. and S.O.V. designed the device. L.A.B. and J.F.S. fabricated the device. The measurements were performed by L.A.B. and W.S.T. with the participation of J.F.S. The experimental set-up was implemented by M.T. and M.V.C., who also helped with the measurements. J.H.G. and S.R. carried out the SHE quantum simulations. L.A.B., W.S.T. and S.O.V analysed the data and wrote the manuscript. All authors contributed to the study, discussed the results and commented on the manuscript. S.O.V. supervised the work.

Corresponding authors

Correspondence to L. Antonio Benítez, Williams Savero Torres or Sergio O. Valenzuela.

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Supplementary Figs. 1–3, discussion and Table 1.

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Benítez, L.A., Savero Torres, W., Sierra, J.F. et al. Tunable room-temperature spin galvanic and spin Hall effects in van der Waals heterostructures. Nat. Mater. 19, 170–175 (2020). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41563-019-0575-1

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