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Magnetic domain wall depinning assisted by spin wave bursts

Nature Physics volume 13, pages 448–454 (2017)Cite this article

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Abstract

Spin waves (SWs) in magnetic structures could potentially be exploited for high-speed, low-power magnonic devices for signal transmission1,2,3,4 and magnetic logic5,6,7,8,9 applications. The short wavelengths and high frequencies of dipole-exchange-mode SWs in metallic ferromagnets make them particularly suitable for nanoscale devices10,11,12,13,14. However, these same characteristics make generation and detection challenging due to the length-scale mismatch of conventional SW interfaces such as microwave striplines. Here we show numerically and experimentally that colliding domain walls (DWs) release energetic spin wave bursts that can couple to and assist depinning of nearby DWs. Hence, DWs can be used as stationary reservoirs of exchange energy that can be efficiently generated, manipulated, and used to release SWs on demand, which can subsequently be detected again using DWs. This work highlights a route towards integrating DWs and SWs for enhanced functionality in spintronics applications.

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Figure 1: Micromagnetic simulations of spin wave emission.
Figure 2: Device and experiment schematic.
Figure 3: Characterizing domain wall depinning, nucleation and annihilation.
Figure 4: Experimental detection of domain wall depinning assisted by spin wave bursts.
Figure 5: Direct electrical detection of spin waves via the inverse spin-Hall effect.

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Acknowledgements

This work was supported in part by C-SPIN, one of the six SRC STARnet Centers, sponsored by MARCO and DARPA. Technical support by D. Bono is gratefully acknowledged. Devices were fabricated using facilities in the MIT Nanostructures Laboratory, the Research Laboratory of Electronics and KIST Micro Fabrication Center. S.W. acknowledges support from the KIST institutional programme funded by Korea Institute of Science and Technology. S.W. also acknowledges S. Emori for critical comments on the manuscript and financial support by the POSCO Science Fellowship of POSCO TJ Park Foundation and Kwanjeong Educational Foundation from South Korea.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Materials Science and Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, Massachusetts 02139, USA

    Seonghoon Woo, Tristan Delaney & Geoffrey S. D. Beach

  2. Center for Spintronics, Korea Institute of Science and Technology, Seoul 02792, Republic of Korea

    Seonghoon Woo

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  1. Seonghoon Woo
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  2. Tristan Delaney
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Contributions

G.S.D.B. proposed and directed the study. S.W. and T.D. conducted micromagnetic simulations. S.W. and G.S.D.B. designed the experiments and S.W. carried out the experiments. S.W. and G.S.D.B. wrote the manuscript with input from T.D.

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Correspondence to Geoffrey S. D. Beach.

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The authors declare no competing financial interests.

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Woo, S., Delaney, T. & Beach, G. Magnetic domain wall depinning assisted by spin wave bursts. Nature Phys 13, 448–454 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1038/nphys4022

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