Dresden 2017 – scientific programme

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MA: Fachverband Magnetismus

MA 49: Surface Magnetism 2 (Joint Session with O)

MA 49.7: Talk

Thursday, March 23, 2017, 11:15–11:30, HSZ 401

Surface orbitronics from the orbital Rashba physics — •Dongwook Go^1,2, Jan-Philipp Hanke¹, Patrick M. Buhl¹, Frank Freimuth¹, Gustav Bihlmayer¹, Hyun-Woo Lee², Yuriy Mokrousov¹, and Stefan Blügel¹ — ¹Institute for Advanced Simulation and Peter Grünberg Institut, Forschungszentrum Jülich and JARA, D-52425 Jülich, Germany — ²Department of Physics, Pohang University of Science and Technology, 37673 Pohang, Korea

As the inversion symmetry is broken at a surface, spin-orbit interaction gives rise to spin-dependent energy shifts − a phenomenon which is known as the spin Rashba effect. Recently, it has been recognized that an orbital counterpart of the spin Rashba effect − the orbital Rashba effect − can be realized at surfaces even without spin-orbit coupling. Here, we propose a mechanism for the orbital Rashba effect based on sp orbital hybridization, which ultimately leads to the electric polarization of surface states. For an experimentally well-studied system of BiAg₂ monolayer, as a proof of principle, we show from first principles that this effect leads to chiral orbital textures in k-space. In predicting the magnitude of the orbital moment arising from the orbital Rashba effect, we demonstrate the crucial role played by the Berry phase theory for the magnitude and variation of the orbital textures. As a result, we predict a pronounced manifestation of various orbital effects at surfaces, and proclaim the orbital Rashba effect to be a key platform for surface orbitronics.

[1] arXiv:1611.04674.