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Quantum materials

Berry does both

Nature Physics (2023)Cite this article

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Local magnetometry measurements on a magnetic Chern insulator suggest that the Berry curvature of the topological band — responsible for the intrinsic magnetism — also enables ultra-low current switching of the magnetization.

The control and manipulation of magnetic order could potentially lead to the development of next-generation memory devices. One crucial factor in these applications is the amount of electrical current required to switch the magnetization, and researchers are searching for new systems that have high switching efficiency. Recent experiments have shown that the magnetization of moiré heterostructures can be flipped with a surprisingly low amount of current, and a better understanding of this phenomenon could help to design energy-efficient magnetic memory. Writing in Nature Physics, Charles Tschirhart and collaborators1 have now shown that the quantum geometric properties of the electrons in moiré heterostructures not only give rise to intrinsic magnetism, but may also be crucial for achieving highly efficient current switching.

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Fig. 1: Spin Hall effect and spin Hall torques in two-dimensional materials.

References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Physics, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Yonglong Xie

  2. Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    Yonglong Xie

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  1. Yonglong Xie
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Correspondence to Yonglong Xie.

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The author declares no competing interests.

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Xie, Y. Berry does both. Nat. Phys. (2023). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-023-01982-z

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-023-01982-z

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