Optical control of magnetism in NiFe/VO2 heterostructures

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates optical control of magnetism in NiFe/VO2 heterostructures, enabling high-speed, low-power spintronic devices through phase-transition induced magnetic modulation.

Contribution

It introduces a novel NiFe/VO2 heterostructure that uses VO2's phase transition for optical magnetic control, enabling programmable logic gates for spintronics.

Findings

Significant modulation of electrical conductivity, coercivity, and magnetic anisotropy.

Interfacial strain coupling is key to magnetic modulation.

Demonstration of high-speed, low-power logic gates using this heterostructure.

Abstract

Optical methods for magnetism manipulation have been considered as a promising strategy for ultralow-power and ultrahigh-speed spin switches, which becomes a hot spot in the field of spintronics. However, a widely applicable and efficient method to combine optical operation with magnetic modulation is still highly desired. Here, the strongly correlated electron material VO2 is introduced to realize phase-transition based optical control of the magnetism in NiFe. The NiFe/VO2 bilayer heterostructure features appreciable modulations in electrical conductivity (55%), coercivity (60%), and magnetic anisotropy (33.5%). Further analyses indicate that interfacial strain coupling plays a crucial role in this modulation. Utilizing this optically controlled magnetism modulation feature, programmable Boolean logic gates (AND, OR, NAND, NOR, XOR, NXOR and NOT) for high-speed and low-power data processing are demonstrated based on this engineered heterostructure. As a demonstration of phase-transition spintronics, this work may pave the way for next-generation electronics in the post-Moore era.