Lasers trigger magnetism in atomically thin quantum materials
Researchers have discovered that light — in the form of a laser — can trigger a form of magnetism in a normally nonmagnetic material. This magnetism centers on the behavior of electrons. These subatomic particles have an electronic property called “spin,” which has a potential application in quantum computing. The researchers found that electrons within the material became oriented in the same direction when illuminated by photons from a laser.
The experiment, led by scientists at the University of Washington and the University of Hong Kong, was published April 20 in Nature.
By controlling and aligning electron spins at this level of detail and accuracy, this platform could have applications in the field of quantum simulation, according to co-senior author Xiaodong Xu, a Boeing Distinguished Professor at the UW in the Department of Physics and the Department of Materials Science and Engineering.
“In this system, we can use photons essentially to control the ‘ground state’ properties — such as magnetism — of charges trapped within the semiconductor material,” said Xu, who is also a faculty researcher with the UW’s Clean Energy Institute and the Molecular Engineering & Sciences Institute. “This is a necessary level of control for developing certain types of qubits — or ‘quantum bits’ — for quantum computing and other applications.”
Xu, whose research team spearheaded the experiments, led the study with co-senior author Wang Yao, professor of physics at the University of Hong Kong, whose team worked on the theory underpinning the results. Other UW faculty members involved in this study are co-authors Di Xiao, a UW professor of physics and of materials science and engineering who also holds a joint appointment at the Pacific Northwest National Laboratory, and Daniel Gamelin, a UW professor of chemistry and director of the Molecular Engineering Materials Center.
The team worked with ultrathin sheets — each just three layers of atoms thick — of tungsten diselenide and tungsten disulfide. Both are semiconductor materials, so named because electrons move through them at a rate between that of a fully conducting metal and an insulator, with potential uses in photonics and solar cells. Researchers stacked the two sheets to form a “moiré superlattice,” a stacked structure made up of repeating units. More