SurfaceScience21 – wissenschaftliches Programm
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O: Fachverband Oberflächenphysik
O 68: Poster Session V: Poster to Mini-Symposium: Manipulation and control of spins on functional surfaces I
O 68.6: Poster
Mittwoch, 3. März 2021, 10:30–12:30, P
Complete reversal of the atomic unquenched orbital moment by a single electron — •Rasa Rejali1, David Coffey1, Jeremie Gobeil1, Jhon W. González2, Fernado Delgado3, and Alexander F. Otte1 — 1Delft University of Technology, Delft, The Netherlands — 2Universidad Técnica Federico Santa María, Valparaíso, Chile — 3Universidad de La Laguna, Santa Cruz de Tenerife, Spain
Efforts to downscale information storage to the single-atom limit have largely focused on readily probing and manipulating the spin of single magnetic atoms adsorbed on surfaces. This emphasis on the spin is primarily due to orbital quenching combined with spin-orbit coupling: the orbital angular momentum of these systems is often diminished due to the local symmetry of the surface, and what remains of it typically delineates the direction of the electron spin. This limits the scope of information processing based on these atoms to essentially one magnetic degree of freedom: the spin. By coordinating a Fe atom atop the fourfold symmetric nitrogen binding site of the Cu2N/Cu3Au(100) surface, we gain independent access to both the spin and orbital degrees of freedom. We demonstrate a full rotation of the orbital moment, without altering the spin state of the atom; and a distinct spin excitation, which does not affect the orbital moment. The full inversion of the unquenched moment is a seemingly forbidden transition (Δm = 4) that defies the selection rules that apply to the spin (Δm = 1); we justify this apparent violation of momentum conversation in terms of the Einstein-de Haas effect.