自旋电子学和自旋流

传统的电子学完全忽略了电子自旋,这使人们在探索未来半导体工业发展时有了新的契机和可能的研究方向.自旋电子学旨在利用电子自旋而非传统的电子电荷为基础, 探讨研发新一代电子产品的可能性.文章简单介绍了自旋电子学的动机、物理基础以及研究内容,并重点介绍了在自旋电子学器件中起关键作用的自旋流.文章从自旋流的定义、它能产生的物理性质和最近有关自旋流探测的理论和实验进展等三个方面进行阐述.

Spintronics and Spin Current

Conventional electronics completely ignores the electron spin, which provides us with an unprecedented chance and new starting point to explore the future of the modem semiconductor and information industry. Spintronics, or spin-based electronics, aims to exploit the subtle and mind-bending esoteric quantum properties of the electron to develop a new generation of electronic devices. In this paper the motivation, fundamental physics, and scope of spintronics will be briefly addressed. The spin current, one of the essential concepts in spintronics, will be discussed in detail, introducing its definition, physical effects, and recent theoretical and experimental progress.