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Scientists successfully develop half metal material that conducts single-spin electrons

Researchers at Forschungszentrum Jülich have successfully created the world’s first experimentally verified two-dimensional half metal—a material that conducts electricity using electrons of just one spin type: either “spin-up” or “spin-down.” Their findings, now published as an Editors’ Suggestion in Physical Review Letters, mark a milestone in the quest for materials enabling energy-efficient spintronic that go beyond conventional electronics.

Half metals are key to spintronics: Unlike traditional conductors, half metals allow only one spin orientation to pass through. This makes them ideal candidates for spintronics, a next-generation information technology that leverages both the charge and the spin of electrons for data storage and processing. In conventional electronics, on the other hand, only the charge is used.

However, all known half metals operate only at and lose their special properties at the surface—limiting their use. This was until now, when the team at Forschungszentrum Jülich engineered a 2D half metal in the form of an ultrathin alloy of iron and palladium, just two atoms thick, on a palladium crystal. Using a state-of-the-art imaging technique called spin-resolved momentum microscopy, they showed that the alloy allows only one spin type to conduct, confirming the long-sought 2D half-metallicity.

Where did all the antimatter go? This mismatch in how subatomic particles behave could hold a clue

The first-known observations of matter–antimatter asymmetry in a decaying composite subatomic particle that belongs to the baryon class are reported from the LHCb experiment located at the Large Hadron Collider at CERN. This effect, known as charge–parity (CP) violation, has been theoretically predicted, but hitherto escaped observation in baryons. The experimental verification of this asymmetry violation in baryons, published in Nature this week, is important as baryons make up most of the matter in the observable universe.

Cosmological models suggest that matter and antimatter were created in equal amounts at the Big Bang, but in the present-day universe matter seems to dominate antimatter. This imbalance is thought to be driven by differences in the behavior of matter and antimatter: a violation of symmetry known as CP violation.

This effect has been predicted by the Standard Model of physics and observed experimentally in subatomic particles called mesons more than 60 years ago, but never previously observed in baryons. As opposed to mesons, which are formed by two quarks, baryons are formed by three quarks—particles that make up most of matter such as neutrons and protons are baryons.

Researchers Solve Long-Standing Magnetic Problem With Atom-Thin Semiconductor

Scientists found a way to control magnetism in ultra-thin materials using CrPS₄, opening the door to more compact and energy-efficient technologies. A recent scientific breakthrough has unveiled a promising new technique for manipulating magnetism in ultra-thin materials, potentially paving the w

Scientists Discover a New “Magic Number” That Could Rewrite the Rules of Nuclear Physics

Physicists have discovered that silicon-22 reveals a new proton magic number offering critical insights into nuclear structure and the forces shaping the universe’s rarest atoms. In nuclear physics, “magic numbers” refer to certain quantities of protons or neutrons that make an atomic nucleus sig

This Forbidden Particle Could Break String Theory

Physicists from the University of Pennsylvania, working with colleagues at Arizona State University, are examining the limitations of a framework that aims to unify the laws of physics throughout the universe. There are two great pillars of thought that don’t quite fit together in physics. The St

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Extreme Conditions of Early Universe Recreated in Collider Experiment

A team of researchers have made progress in understanding how some of the Universe’s heaviest particles behave under extreme conditions similar to those that existed just after the Big Bang.

A study published in Physics Reports provides new insights into the fundamental forces that shaped our Universe and continues to guide its evolution today.

The research, conducted by an international team from the University of Barcelona, the Indian Institute of Technology, and Texas A&M University, focuses on particles containing heavy quarks, the building blocks of some of the most massive particles in existence.

Scientists detect new ‘quantum echo’ in superconducting materials

Scientists at the U. S. Department of Energy Ames National Laboratory and Iowa State University have discovered an unexpected “quantum echo” in a superconducting material. This discovery provides insight into quantum behaviors that could be used for next-generation quantum sensing and computing technologies.

Superconductors are materials that carry electricity without resistance. Within these are collective vibrations known as “Higgs modes.” A Higgs mode is a that occurs when its electron potential fluctuates in a similar way to a Higgs boson. They appear when a material is undergoing a superconducting phase transition.

Observing these vibrations has been a long-time challenge for scientists because they exist for a very short time. They also have complex interactions with quasiparticles, which are electron-like excitations that emerge from the breakdown of superconductivity.