Related papers: Twisted light affects ultrafast demagnetization
The employment of femtosecond pulsed lasers has received significant attention due to its capability to facilitate fabrication of precise patterns at the micro- and nano- lengths scales. A key issue for efficient material processing is the…
The dynamic control of novel states of matter beyond thermodynamic equilibrium is a fundamental pursuit in condensed matter physics. Intense terahertz fields have enabled metal-insulator transitions, superconductivity, quantum paraelectric…
We investigate the discrete orbital angular momentum (OAM) of photoelectrons freed in strongfield ionization. We use these `twisted' electrons to provide an alternative interpretation on existing experimental work of vortex interferences…
Thermally-assisted ultra-fast magnetization reversal in a DC magnetic field for magnetic multilayer thin films with perpendicular anisotropy has been investigated in the time domain using femtosecond laser heating. The experiment is set-up…
We study ultrafast magnetization quenching of ferromagnetic iron following excitation by an optical vs a terahertz pump pulse. While the optical pump (photon energy of 3.1 eV) induces a strongly nonthermal electron distribution, terahertz…
While spin polarization from synchrotron radiation is well established, the polarization of orbital angular momentum (OAM) in such radiative processes remains elusive. We study radiation and polarization of relativistic electrons in a…
Heat and disorder are opponents of magnetism. This fact, expressed in Curie's law established more than a century ago, holds even in the highly non-equilibrium interaction of ultra-intense laser pulses with magnetic matter. In contradiction…
The remagnetization process after ultrafast demagnetization can be described by relaxation mechanisms between the spin, electron, and lattice reservoirs. Thereby, collective spin excitations in form of spin waves and their angular momentum…
Strong laser-induced magnetization of oxygen gas at room temperature and atmospheric pressure is achieved experimentally on the sub-nanosecond time scale. The method is based on controlling the electronic spin of paramagnetic molecules by…
The observed magnetization switching by circularly polarized ultrafast laser pulses has been attributed to the inverse Faraday effect in which the induced non-equilibrium orbital momentum serves as an effective magnetic filed via spin-orbit…
Photo-excitation in complex oxides1 transfers charge across semicovalent bonds, drastically perturbing spin and orbital orders2. Light may then be used in compounds like magnetoresistive manganites to control magnetism on nanometre…
The spin dynamics in Ni is studied by an exact diagonalization method on the ultrafast time scale. It is shown that the femtosecond relaxation of the magneto-optical response results from exchange interaction and spin-orbit coupling. Each…
Light-induced rotation of absorbing microscopic particles by transfer of angular momentum from light to the material raises the possibility of optically driven micromachines. The phenomenon has been observed using elliptically polarized…
Since the discovery of ultrafast demagnetization in Ni thin films in 1996, laser-induced ultrafast spin dynamics have become a prominent research topic in the field of magnetism and spintronics. This development offers new possibilities for…
The interaction of polarized light with a spin in the presence of dissipation is shown to be equivalent to a spin transfer process that can cause switching. In plasmas, the spin transfer is dominated by a spin-spin exchange term while at…
Based on nonlinear optics, we develop a band theory to elucidate how light could manipulate magnetization, which is rooted by the quantum geometric structure and topological nature of electronic wavefunctions. Their existence are determined…
The insight that optical vortex beams carry orbital angular momentum (OAM), which emerged in Leiden about 30 years ago, has since led to an ever expanding range of applications and follow-up studies. This paper starts with a short personal…
The Barnett effect, discovered more than a century ago, describes how an inertial body with otherwise zero net magnetic moment acquires spontaneous magnetization when mechanically spinning. Breakthrough experiments have recently shown that…
We demonstrate all-optical manipulation of magnetic domains in NiO/Pt and CoO/Pt thin films with insulating antiferromagnetic layers. Using magneto-optical birefringence imaging, we show that even a single laser pulse can thermally…
We propose a semi-classical model for femtosecond-laser induced demagnetization due to spin-polarized excited electron diffusion in the super-diffusive regime. Our approach treats the finite elapsed time and transport in space between…