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MA: Fachverband Magnetismus

MA 13: Magnetic Materials II

MA 13.5: Talk

Tuesday, March 8, 2016, 10:30–10:45, H31

Determining the Verdet constant in antiferromagnetic materials — •Christian Tzschaschel¹, Stefan Günther¹, Takuya Satoh², and Manfred Fiebig¹ — ¹ETH Zürich, Switzerland — ²Kyushu University, Japan

Recently, in the context of all-optical switching and ultrafast magnon generation, the Faraday effect and its inverse were discussed as possible mechanisms allowing to probe and stimulate magnetic excitations. The strength of both processes is related to the Verdet constant - a material parameter describing light-matter interactions in magnetic fields.

By measuring the spectral dependence of the Faraday rotation under the application of magnetic fields up to 6 T at temperatures down to 4 K, we are able to investigate fully compensated antiferromagnets like NiO and determine the Verdet constant in a broad spectral range covering the visible and near infrared. Subsequently, we compare the results to Bismuth-doped Yttrium-Iron-garnet as a well-known example of a material exhibiting a finite spontaneous magnetization.

Our results can be used to maximize the magnon generation efficiency with circularly polarized light via the inverse Faraday effect and at the same time optimize the sensitivity for the detection of magnetic excitations.