(Nanowerk News) Graphene is very strong, lightweight, permeable – the list of its high quality properties goes on.
It is not, however, magnetic ?? a deficit that has halted its usefulness in spintronics, an emerging field that scientists say could rewrite electronic rules, leading to semiconductors , more powerful computers and other devices.
Now, an international research team led by the University of Buffalo is reporting on progress that could overcome this hurdle.
In a study published in the journal Corporate Review Letters (“Remote Mesoscopic Signs of Intrusive Magnetic Texture in Graphene”), researchers describe how they pair a magnet with graphene, and include what they define as ?? artificial magnetic texture ?? in the surprisingly nonmagnetic material.
?? Independently of each other, graphene and spintronics have an incredible ability to fundamentally change every aspect of business and society. But if you can combine the two, the synergistic effects seem to be something this world has not yet seen, ?? said lead author Nargess Arabchigavkani, who conducted the research as a PhD candidate at UB and is now a postgraduate research partner at the SUNY Polytechnic Institute.
Additional authors represent UB, King Mongkut Institute of Technology ?? Ladkrabang in Thailand, Chiba University in Japan, China University of Science and Technology, Nebraska University Omaha, University of Nebraska Lincoln, and Uppsala University in Sweden.
For their experiments, researchers placed a 20-nanometer-thick magnet in direct contact with a sheet of graphene, which is a single layer of carbon atoms arranged in a two-dimensional honeycomb surface of less than 1 nanometer of graphene. thickness.
?? To make you notice the size difference, it ‘s something like putting a brick on a sheet of paper, ?? said study lead author Jonathan Bird, PhD, professor and chair of electrical engineering at UB School of Engineering and Applied Sciences.
Researchers then placed eight electrodes in different locations around the graphene and magnet to measure their conductivity.
The lightning appeared surprising ?? the magnet stimulated a synthetic texture in the graphene that stood even in areas of the graphene away from the magnet. Simply put, the close communication between the two objects caused the normal non-electromagnetic carbon to behave differently, exhibiting magnetic properties similar to common magnetic materials such as iron or cobalt.
Moreover, it has been found that these properties can completely overwhelm the natural properties of graphene, even when you look several microns away from the contact area of the graphene and the magnet. This distance (a micron is a millionth of a million meters), while very small, is relatively large speaking microscopically.
The findings raise important questions related to the microscopic origins of the magnetic texture in graphene.
More importantly, Bird says, the extent to which the induced magnetic behavior arises from the influence of spin polarization and / or spin-orbit bonding, which is a phenomenon known to be closely related to the magnetic properties of materials and to the technology emerging spintronics.
Instead of using the electric charge that electrons carry (as in traditional electronics), spintronic machines try to make use of a special quantum building of electrons called spin (which seems to be to the ground spinning on its own axis). Spin offers the ability to pack more data into smaller devices, thus increasing the power of semiconductors, quantum computers, large storage devices and other digital electronics.