Ever since graphene was first isolated a few years ago, this
quasi-two-dimensional network made up of a single layer of carbon atoms has
been considered the magic material. Not only is graphene mechanically highly
resilient, it also provides an interesting basis for new spintronic components
that exploit the magnetic moment of conduction electrons.
Now, Helmholtz Centre Berlin’s Dr. Andrei Varykhalov, Prof.
Dr. Oliver Rader and his team of physicists has taken the first step towards
building graphene-based components, in collaboration with physicists from St.
Petersburg (Russia), Jülich (Germany) and Harvard (USA). According to their
report on 27th November 2012 in Nature
Communications (DOI: 10.1038/ncomms2227), they successfully managed to increase
the graphene conduction electrons’ spin-orbit coupling by a factor of 10,000 –
enough to allow them to construct a switch that can be controlled via small
electric fields.