Infoscience

Conference paper

Spintronics: Conceptual Building Blocks

Ansermet, J.-Ph.
  • Presented at: 5th School on Magnetism and Synchrotron Radiation, Mittelwihr, FRANCE, Oct 19-24, 2008
  • Published in: Magnetism And Synchrotron Radiation: New Trends (ISBN: 978-3-642-04497-7), vol. 133, p. 43-76
  • Series: Springer Proceedings in Physics
  • Springer-Verlag New York, Ms Ingrid Cunningham, 175 Fifth Ave, New York, Ny 10010 Usa, 2010

The purpose of this introduction to spintronics is to provide some elementary description of its conceptual building blocks. Thus, it is intended for a newcomer to the field. After recalling rudimentary descriptions of spin precession and spin relaxation, spin-dependent transport is treated within the Boltzmann formalism. This suffices to introduce key notions such as the spin asymmetry of the conductivities in the two-current model, the spin diffusion length, and spin accumulation. Two basic mechanisms of spin relaxation are then presented, one arising from spin orbit scattering and the other from electron-magnon collisions. Finally, the action of a spin-polarized current on magnetization is presented in a thermodynamics framework. This introduces the notion of spin torque and the characteristic length scale over which the transverse spin polarization of conduction electron decays as it is injected into a magnet.

Keywords: Magnetic Multilayers ; Ferromagnetic Relaxation ; Conduction Electrons ; 2-Current Conduction ; Spin-Resonance ; Domain-Wall ; Metals ; Excitation ; Scattering ; Currents

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Record created on 2011-12-16, modified on 2012-06-04

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