Abstract
Fluctuations of quantum spins play a crucial role in the emergence of exotic magnetic phases and excitations. The lack of the charge degree of freedom in insulating quantum magnets, however, precludes such fluctuations from mediating electronic transport. Here, we show that the quantum fluctuations of a localized frustrated magnet induce strong proximitized charge transport of the conduction electrons in a synthetic heterostructure comprising an epitaxial Bi2Ir2O7 ultrathin film on a single crystal of Yb2Ti2O7. The proximity effects are evidenced by the scaling behavior of the Bi2Ir2O7 resistance in correspondence with the dynamic scaling of the dynamic spin-correlation function of Yb2Ti2O7, which is a result of quantum fluctuations near a multiphase quantum critical point. The proximitized transport in Bi2Ir2O7 can be effectively tuned by a magnetic field through suppressing the quantum spin fluctuations (QSFs) as well as inducing transitions via magnetic anisotropy in Yb2Ti2O7. In this paper, we establish a pathway for harnessing QSFs in magnetic insulators with electric transport, offering exciting prospects for potential applications in the realm of quantum spintronics.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Article number | 114407 |
| Journal | Physical Review Materials |
| Volume | 8 |
| Issue number | 11 |
| DOIs | |
| State | Published - Nov 2024 |
Funding
This paper is supported by the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) under Grant No. DE-SC0020254. The authors thank Allen Scheie and Cristian Batista for fruitful discussions. The authors thank Jenia Karapetrova for assistance with the synchrotron x-ray diffraction and Zhigang Jiang for assistance with the atomic force microscopy measurement. C.X. acknowledges support from the Center for Material Processing at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. The synchrotron x-ray diffraction measurement used resources of the Advanced Photon Source, a DOE Office of Science User Facility operated for the DOE Office of Science by Argonne National Laboratory under Contract No. DE-AC02-06CH11357. A portion of this work was performed at the National High Magnetic Field Laboratory, which is supported by the National Science Foundation Cooperative Agreement No. DMR-1644779 and the state of Florida. Y.Z. is supported by the startup fund at the University of Tennessee.