Twisting the near-field radiative heat switch in hyperbolic antiferromagnets

TL;DR

This paper investigates how twisting and magnetic fields influence near-field radiative heat transfer between hyperbolic antiferromagnetic insulators, revealing nonmonotonic flux behavior and proposing a thermal switch device.

Contribution

It introduces a novel control mechanism combining twist angle and magnetic fields to modulate heat transfer in hyperbolic antiferromagnets, including a proposed thermal switch device.

Findings

Magnetic fields cause nonmonotonic heat flux changes, with a minimum at about 1.5 T.

Magnetic fields alter magnon polariton topologies and induce volume magnon polaritons.

Twist angle and magnetic field together enable dynamic regulation of radiative heat transfer.

Abstract

We study the twisted control of the near-field radiative heat transfer between two hyperbolic antiferromagnetic insulators under external magnetic fields. We show that the near-field heat flux can be affected by both the twist angle $\theta$ and the magnitude of the applied magnetic field with different broken symmetries. Irrespective of twist angle, the external magnetic field causes the radiative heat flux to change nonmonotonically, and the minimum heat flux can be found with the magnetic fields of about 1.5 T. Such nonmonotonic behavior is due to the fact that the magnetic field can radically change the nature of the magnon polaritons with time reversal symmetry breaking. The field not only affects the topological structure of surface magnon polaritons, but also induces the volume magnon polaritons that progressively dominate the heat transfer as the field increases. We further propose a twist-induced thermal switch device with inversion symmetry breaking, which can severely regulate radiative heat flux through different magnetic fields. Our findings account for a characteristic modulation of radiative heat transfer with implications for applications in dynamic thermal management.