The orbital Hall effect has been theoretically predicted but its direct observation is a challenge. Here, we report the magneto-optical detection of current-induced orbital accumulation at the surface of a light 3d transition metal, Cr. The orbital polarization is in-plane, transverse to the current direction, and scales linearly with current density, consistent with the orbital Hall effect. Comparing the thickness-dependent magneto-optical measurements with ab initio calculations, we estimate an orbital diffusion length in Cr of 6.6±0.6 nm.
@article{arxiv.2306.10673,
title = {Magneto-Optical Detection of the Orbital Hall Effect in Chromium},
author = {Igor Lyalin and Sanaz Alikhah and Marco Berritta and Peter M. Oppeneer and Roland K. Kawakami},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2306.10673},
year = {2023}
}