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Challenges and opportunities in orbitronics

Nature Physics (2025)Cite this article

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Abstract

The ability to control the spin degrees of freedom of electrons has enabled the development of spintronic devices that use spin, rather than just electric charge, to store and process information. The concepts of spintronics are now applied in technologies such as magnetic sensors and non-volatile memory devices. In addition to spin, electrons can carry orbital angular momentum. However, research into the use of orbital angular momentum is still in its early stages. Recent discoveries of phenomena mediated by orbital angular momentum have led to a new branch of physics called orbitronics. Here we explore how orbitronics may represent the next phase in the evolution of spintronics by reviewing the current theoretical understanding, challenges and experimental results related to orbital effects. We also outline key open questions and discusses potential applications, with a focus on non-volatile memory technologies.

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Fig. 1: Depictions of the spin–orbit torque and orbital torque mechanisms.
Fig. 2: The concept of orbital torques in a multilayer.

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Acknowledgements

We thank P. Oppeneer, Y. Mokrousov and H.-W. Lee for providing valuable feedback and suggestions on the manuscript. S.F. acknowledges financial support from MEXT X-NICS (JPJ011438), JSPS Kakenhi (24H00039 and 24H02235), JST-ASPIRE JPMJAP2322 and RIEC Cooperative Research Projects. K.-J.L. acknowledges financial support from the National Research Foundation of Korea (RS-2022-NR068225, RS-2024-00410027, RS-2024-00436660 and RS-2025-00516229) and Samsung Electronics (IO201019-07699-01). M.K. acknowledges TopDyn, the German Research Foundation (TRR 173-268565370 Spin+X: A01, A11, B02, TRR 288-422213477 Elasto-Q-Mat: A12 and project 358671374), the Horizon Europe Framework (grant number 101070290 (NIMFEIA), grant number 101070287 (Swan-on-Chip), grant number 101226840 (ORBIS) and grant number 101129641 (OBELIX)), the European Research Council (grant number 856538 (3D MAGiC)), King Abdullah University of Science and Technology (KAUST) under award 2024−CRG12−6480 and the Research Council of Norway through its Centers of Excellence funding scheme under project number 262633 ‘QuSpin’.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Research Institute of Electrical Communication, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan

    Shunsuke Fukami

  2. Center for Science and Innovation in Spintronics, Tohoku University, Sendai, Japan

    Shunsuke Fukami & Mathias Kläui

  3. Department of Physics, Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST), Daejeon, Republic of Korea

    Kyung-Jin Lee

  4. Institut für Physik, Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz, Mainz, Germany

    Mathias Kläui

  5. Centre for Quantum Spintronics, Norwegian University of Science and Technology NTNU, Trondheim, Norway

    Mathias Kläui

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  1. Shunsuke Fukami
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  2. Kyung-Jin Lee
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  3. Mathias Kläui
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S.F., K.-J.L. and M.K. contributed equally to writing the manuscript.

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Correspondence to Shunsuke Fukami, Kyung-Jin Lee or Mathias Kläui.

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Fukami, S., Lee, KJ. & Kläui, M. Challenges and opportunities in orbitronics. Nat. Phys. (2025). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41567-025-03143-w

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