Coursera, Spring 2013 Instructors: Charles W. Clark and Victor Galitski
Guest Lecture: Electron Spin Part IV: Spin Exchange and Magnetism Guest lecturer: Prof. Ian Appelbaum, U. Maryland Physics Dept. http://appelbaum.physics.umd.edu Permutation symmetry Pauli exclusion principle is the result of Fermion wavefunction antisymmetry upon particle exchange But the wavefunction includes spatial coordinates and spin! Indistinguishability: Electrons (fermions): But the wavefunction includes spatial coordinates and spin! So we can include a spatially symmetric wavefunction if the spin components are antisymmetric singlet triplet (1) (0) (-1) (0) Exchange energy (like in neutral He, where H 12 is Coulomb repulsion) A generic example: Exchange integral Magnitude of exchange energy Because it is coupled to electrostatic configuration, the exchange energy can be very large. Much larger than direct magnetostatic energy: Bohr magneton Fine structure constant Bohr radius Fine structure constant This is the same as the interaction between spin and the orbital moments: spin-orbit splitting! Exchange Hamiltonian (s are 2x2 matrices) Kronecker product: Eigenfunctions of Exchange Remember: -3J +J +J +J diagonalization: Our basis is Remember: singlet triplet Heisenberg model i Short-range interaction only: Mean field Zeeman energy with The mean field caused by spin exchange causes a preferred spin orientation a magnetically ordered state at lowtemperatures! (J<0: Ferromagnet, J>0: Anti-Ferromagnet) This was for localized moments in a lattice: an insulator. What about a metal? (degenerate) electron gas: plane-waves k y k x k z Pauli Exclusion Energy Minimization Spin degeneracy Energy ~ |k| 2 Density of states (DoS) Spin up Spin down (filled up to k F ) (filled up to E F ) Metals in Equilibrium: A Review in One Slide Questions: 1. How to transfer this spin asymmetry to nonmagnetic systems? 2. What are the processes that govern relaxation back to equilibrium? 3. How to manipulate spin asymmetry before equilibriumis obtained? 4. How can we engineer devices with unique applications, e.g. logic, interconnects etc.? (Ferro)magnetic metal: DoS Spin up Spin down E Spin polarized: Mean field splitting Spin Electronics Albert Fert Peter Gruenberg Nobel Prize 2007