Spin-flip reflection at the normal metal-spin superconductor interface

TL;DR

This paper investigates spin transport at a normal metal-spin superconductor interface, revealing how spin-flip reflection influences conductance and demonstrating perfect spin-flip reflection conditions in different material models.

Contribution

It introduces the concept of spin-flip reflection at the interface and analyzes its effects in graphene-based and quadratic-dispersion normal metal-spin superconductor junctions.

Findings

Perfect spin-flip reflection occurs at normal incidence.

Spin conductance is proportional to the spin-flip reflection coefficient.

Spin-flip reflection can reach unity at specific energies.

Abstract

We study spin transport through a normal metal-spin superconductor junction. A spin-flip reflection is demonstrated at the interface, where a spin-up electron incident from the normal metal can be reflected as a spin-down electron and the spin $2\times \hbar/2$ will be injected into the spin superconductor. When the (spin) voltage is smaller than the gap of the spin superconductor, the spin-flip reflection determines the transport properties of the junction. We consider both graphene-based (linear-dispersion-relation) and quadratic-dispersion-relation normal metal-spin superconductor junctions in detail. For the two-dimensional graphene-based junction, the spin-flip reflected electron can be along the specular direction (retro-direction) when the incident and reflected electron locates in the same band (different bands). A perfect spin-flip reflection can occur when the incident electron is normal to the interface, and the reflection coefficient is slightly suppressed for the oblique incident case. As a comparison, for the one-dimensional quadratic-dispersion-relation junction, the spin-flip reflection coefficient can reach 1 at certain incident energies. In addition, both the charge current and the spin current under a charge (spin) voltage are studied. The spin conductance is proportional to the spin-flip reflection coefficient when the spin voltage is less than the gap of the spin superconductor. These results will help us get a better understanding of spin transport through the normal metal-spin superconductor junction.