'Spintronics' for next generation equipment

Using powerful lasers, Hui Zhao, Professor of physics and astronomy at the University of Kansas and graduate student Lalani Werake have discovered a new way to recognise the currents of spinning electrons in a semiconductor.

Their findings could be the way to the development of superior equipment and electronics. the results of their work in the laboratory of the KU Ultrafast laser would be reported in the recent edition of physical nature, a daily leader evaluated by peers and posted online at the beginning of August.

Zhao and Werake electronic research based on the rotation, nicknamed "spintronics."

"The goal is to replace all - from computers for memory - devices have a higher performance and lower energy consumption," said Zhao.

KU researcher said that future developments for microchips would require a different approach for the streaming of ones and zeros that compose digital information.

"We have been using the electron charge for several decades," said Zhao. "But why now is the size of each device only 30 to 50 nanometers and you don't have a number of atoms remaining in such a small scale."We "cannot continue way longer because we are hitting a fundamental limit".

Instead of using the presence or absence of electronic charges, spintronics depends on the direction of rotation of an electron to transmit data.

"" In general terms, an electron can be seen as a small ball rotates like a ball baseball,"said Zhao."The difference is that a baseball ball can rotate at full speed, but an electron can only rotate at a certain speed - either to the left or to the derecha.Por therefore, we can use a swing state to represent 'zero' and another to represent 'one'."Because a single electron can take this information, it takes much less time and less energy".

However, a major obstacle for spintronics scientists has been the difficulty in detecting the flow of electrons spinning real-time.

""We have not been able to control the speed of electrons spinning, but speed is linked to the current drawing,"Zhao said.""By what has been absolute directly detect the current rotation to date".

The finding of Zhao and Werake changes that.

KU scientists have discovered that it shines on a piece of Semiconductor Laser lightning generates different if flowing electrons spinning and the brightness of the light new correlation with the force of the current drawing color lights.

The optical illusion known as "harmonic second-generation" can monitor spin-current time real without altering the current per yea mismo.Zhao compares his new method with a police officer, which controls the speed of a car as it passes radar gun.

This greatly improves spin-current analysis currently in use, the KU researcher says is similar to analyze even photographs to determine the speed of a car, long after the car has hastened away.

"" Spintronics is still in the research phase, and we hope that this new technology can be used in laboratories to discuss issues of interest to researchers,"said Zhao.""As they become countries industrialised spintronics, we hope that this could become a technical routine to check the quality of the devices, for example".