Related papers: All-optical non-linear chiral ultrafast magnetizat…
Irradiating solids with ultrashort laser pulses is known to initiate femtosecond timescale magnetization dynamics. However, sub-femtosecond spin dynamics have not yet been observed or predicted. Here, we explore ultrafast light-driven spin…
The ultimate control of magnetic states of matter at femtosecond (or even faster) timescales defines one of the most pursued paradigm shifts for future information technology. In this context, ultrafast laser pulses developed into extremely…
Sculpting sub-cycle temporal structures of optical waveforms allows one to image and even control electronic clouds in atoms, molecules and solids. Here we show how the transverse spin component arising upon spatial confinement of such…
Magnetic recording using circularly polarized femto-second laser pulses is an emerging technology that would allow write speeds much faster than existing field driven methods. However, the mechanism that drives the magnetization switching…
Using an ultrafast laser pulse to manipulate the spin degree of freedom has broad technological appeal. It allows one to control the spin dynamics on a femtosecond time scale. The discipline, commonly called femtomagnetism, started with the…
Employing electron spin instead of charge to develop spintronic devices holds the merits of low-power consumption in information technologies. Meanwhile, the demand for increasing speed in spintronics beyond current CMOS technology has…
The non-thermal optical control of magnetic order offers a promising route to ultrafast, energy-efficient information technologies. Although optical manipulation of magnetism in metals has been extensively studied, experimentally…
An all-optical method of ultrafast spin rotation is put forward to precisely manipulate the polarization of relativistic charged particle beams of leptons or ions. In particular, laser-driven dense ultrashort beams are manipulated via…
The orbital angular momenta (OAM) of electrons play an increasingly important role in ultrafast electron and magnetization dynamics. In this theoretical study, we investigate the electron dynamics induced by femtosecond laser pulses in a…
Laser radiation incident on a ferromagnetic sample produces excited electrons and currents whose spin polarization must not be aligned with the magnetization -- an effect due to spin-orbit coupling that is ubiquitous in spin- and…
Light polarization is one of the most fundamental features, equivalent to energy and coherence. Magnetism changes light polarization, and vice versa. The irradiation of intense circularly polarized femtosecond pules to magnetic materials…
We explore the possibility of ultrafast, coherent all-optical magnetization switching in antiferromagnets by studying the action of the inverse Faraday effect in CrPt, an easy-plane antiferromagnet. Using a combination of density functional…
Light-induced magnetization changes, such as all-optical switching, skyrmion nucleation, and intersite spin transfer, unfold on temporal and spatial scales down to femtoseconds and nanometers, respectively. Pump-probe spectroscopy and…
We describe a mechanism by which both ferroelectric polarization and magnetization can be created in nonpolar, nonmagnetic materials. Using a combination of phenomenological modeling and first-principles calculations, we demonstrate that…
The ultrafast non-thermal control of magnetization has recently become feasible in canted antiferromagnets through photomagnetic instantaneous pulses [A.V. Kimel {\it et al.}, Nature {\bf 435}, 655 (2005)]. In this experiment circularly…
Magnetization reversal by a femtosecond circularly polarized laser pulse has been recently demonstrated in rare-earth doped transition metals (RE-TM). The switching mechanism has been attributed to an inverse Faraday effect and thermal…
Optical generation of complex spin textures is one of the most exciting challenges of modern spintronics. Here, we uncover a distinct physical mechanism for imprinting spin chirality into collinear magnets with short laser pulses. By…
Controlling ultrafast magnetization dynamics by a femtosecond laser is attracting interest both in fundamental science and industry because of the potential to achieve magnetic domain switching at ever advanced speed. Here we report…
Laser pulses are known to induce symmetric demagnetization: equal loss of magnetic moments in the identical sublattices of antiferromagnets and ferromagnets at ultrashort timescales. Using time-dependent density functional theory, we show…
Coherent light-matter interactions have recently extended their applications to the ultrafast control of magnetization in solids. An important but unrealized technique is the manipulation of magnetization vector motion to make it follow an…