Person:

van der Sar, Toeno

Pushing the frontiers of condensed-matter magnetism requires the development of tools that provide real-space, few-nanometre-scale probing of correlated-electron magnetic excitations under ambient conditions. Here we present a practical approach to meet this challenge, using magnetometry based on single nitrogen-vacancy centres in diamond. We focus on spin-wave excitations in a ferromagnetic microdisc, and demonstrate local, quantitative and phase-sensitive detection of the spin-wave magnetic field at ~50 nm from the disc. We map the magnetic-field dependence of spin-wave excitations by detecting the associated local reduction in the disc’s longitudinal magnetization. In addition, we characterize the spin–noise spectrum by nitrogen-vacancy spin relaxometry, finding excellent agreement with a general analytical description of the stray fields produced by spin–spin correlations in a 2D magnetic system. These complementary measurement modalities pave the way towards imaging the local excitations of systems such as ferromagnets and antiferromagnets, skyrmions, atomically assembled quantum magnets, and spin ice.

The spin chemical potential characterizes the tendency of spins to diffuse. Probing this quantity could provide insight into materials such as magnetic insulators and spin liquids and aid optimization of spintronic devices. Here we introduce single-spin magnetometry as a generic platform for nonperturbative, nanoscale characterization of spin chemical potentials. We experimentally realize this platform using diamond nitrogen-vacancy centers and use it to investigate magnons in a magnetic insulator, finding that the magnon chemical potential can be controlled by driving the system's ferromagnetic resonance. We introduce a symmetry-based two-fluid theory describing the underlying magnon processes, measure the local thermomagnonic torque, and illustrate the detection sensitivity using electrically controlled spin injection. Our results pave the way for nanoscale control and imaging of spin transport in mesoscopic systems.

Confined to a two-dimensional plane, electrons in a strong magnetic field travel along the edge in one-dimensional quantum Hall channels that are protected against backscattering. These channels can be used as solid-state analogs of monochromatic beams of light, providing a unique platform for studying electron interference. Electron interferometry is regarded as one of the most promising routes for studying fractional and non-Abelian statistics and quantum entanglement via two-particle interference. However, creating an edge-channel interferometer in which electron-electron interactions play an important role requires a clean system and long phase coherence lengths. We realize electronic Mach-Zehnder interferometers with record visibilities of up to 98% using spin- and valley-polarized edge channels that copropagate along a pn junction in graphene. We find that interchannel scattering between same-spin edge channels along the physical graphene edge can be used to form beamsplitters, whereas the absence of interchannel scattering along gate-defined interfaces can be used to form isolated interferometer arms. Surprisingly, our interferometer is robust to dephasing effects at energies an order of magnitude larger than those observed in pioneering experiments on GaAs/AlGaAs quantum wells. Our results shed light on the nature of edge-channel equilibration and open up new possibilities for studying exotic electron statistics and quantum phenomena.