English

Chiral Phonons Arising From Chirality-Selective Magnon-Phonon Coupling

Materials Science 2025-11-19 v2

Abstract

Chiral phonons are desirable for applications in spintronics but their generation and control remains a challenge.Here we demonstrate the emergence of truly chiral phonons from selective magnon-phonon coupling in inversion-symmetric magnetic systems. Considering bcc Fe as example, we quantitatively calculate hybridized magnon-phonon quasiparticle states across the entire Brillouin zone utilizing first-principles calculations. Our findings challenge conventional magneto-elastic interpretations and reveal finite zero-point phonon angular momentum and strong anomalous thermal Hall responses linked to finite (spin) Berry curvatures. Our results further establish that the existence of chiral phonons, particularly along high-symmetry directions, is common in many magnetic materials, offering promising avenues for novel spintronic and phononic devices.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2411.03879,
  title  = {Chiral Phonons Arising From Chirality-Selective Magnon-Phonon Coupling},
  author = {Markus Weißenhofer and Philipp Rieger and M. S. Mrudul and Luca Mikadze and Ulrich Nowak and Peter M. Oppeneer},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2411.03879},
  year   = {2025}
}
R2 v1 2026-06-28T19:50:06.076Z