“Beyond the quantum implications, this is the first time we’ve observed broken symmetry in a hybrid organic-inorganic perovskite.”Andrew Comstock, North Carolina State University
By utilizing the so-called Dzyaloshinskii–Moriya-Interaction (DMI), an international team of researchers has produced a mixed magnon state in an organic hybrid perovskite material, showing that it has potential for processing and storing quantum computing information. This work expands the number of potential materials that can be used to create hybrid magnonic systems.
In magnetic materials, quasi-particles called magnons direct the electron spin within the material. There are two types of magnons – optical and acoustic – which refer to the direction of their spin.
“Both optical and acoustic magnons propagate spin waves in antiferromagnets,” says Dali Sun, associate professor of physics and a member of the Organic and Carbon Electronics Lab (ORaCEL) at North Carolina State University (NC State). “But in order to use spin waves to process quantum information, you need a mixed spin wave state.
“Normally two magnon modes cannot generate a mixed spin state due to their different symmetries. But by harnessing the DMI we discovered a hybrid perovskite with a mixed magnon state.” Sun is corresponding author of a paper on this work in Nature Communications.
The researchers produced this mixed magnon state by adding an organic cation to the hybrid perovskite material, thereby creating a particular interaction called a DMI. In short, the DMI was able to break the symmetry of the material, allowing the spins to mix.
For this study, the team utilized a copper-based magnetic hybrid organic-inorganic perovskite with a unique octahedral structure. These octahedrons can tilt and deform in different ways. Adding an organic cation to the material breaks the symmetry, creating angles within the material that allow the different magnon modes to couple and the spins to mix.
“Beyond the quantum implications, this is the first time we’ve observed broken symmetry in a hybrid organic-inorganic perovskite,” says Andrew Comstock, a graduate research assistant at NC State and first author of the paper.
“We found that the DMI allows magnon coupling in copper-based hybrid perovskite materials with the correct symmetry requirements. Adding different cations creates different effects. This work really opens up ways to create magnon coupling from a lot of different materials – and studying the dynamic effects of this material can teach us new physics as well.”
This story is adapted from material from North Carolina State University, with editorial changes made by Materials Today. The views expressed in this article do not necessarily represent those of Elsevier. Link to original source.