Correlation-Enhanced Interaction of a Bose-Einstein Condensate with Parametric Magnon Pairs and Virtual Magnons.

Nonlinear interactions are crucial in science and engineering. Here, we investigate wave interactions in a highly nonlinear magnetic system driven by parametric pumping leading to Bose-Einstein condensation of spin-wave quanta-magnons. Using Brillouin light scattering spectroscopy in yttrium-iron garnet films, we found and identified a set of nonlinear processes resulting in off-resonant spin-wave excitations-virtual magnons. In particular, we discovered a dynamically strong, correlation-enhanced four-wave interaction process of the magnon condensate with pairs of parametric magnons having opposite wave vectors and fully correlated phases.

Rapid-prototyping of microscopic thermal landscapes in Brillouin light scattering spectroscopy.

Since temperature and its spatial, and temporal variations affect a wide range of physical properties of material systems, they can be used to create reconfigurable spatial structures of various types in physical and biological objects. This paper presents an experimental optical setup for creating tunable two-dimensional temperature patterns on a micrometer scale. As an example of its practical application, we have produced temperature-induced magnetization landscapes in ferrimagnetic yttrium iron garnet films and investigated them using micro-focused Brillouin light scattering spectroscopy. It is shown that, due to the temperature dependence of the magnon spectrum, spatial temperature distributions can be visualized even for microscale thermal patterns.

Control of the Bose-Einstein Condensation of Magnons by the Spin Hall Effect.

Previously, it has been shown that rapid cooling of yttrium-iron-garnet-platinum nanostructures, preheated by an electric current sent through the Pt layer, leads to overpopulation of a magnon gas and to subsequent formation of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) of magnons. The spin Hall effect (SHE), which creates a spin-polarized current in the Pt layer, can inject or annihilate magnons depending on the electric current and applied field orientations. Here we demonstrate that the injection or annihilation of magnons via the SHE can prevent or promote the formation of a rapid cooling-induced magnon BEC. Depending on the current polarity, a change in the BEC threshold of -8% and +6% was detected. These findings demonstrate a new method to control macroscopic quantum states, paving the way for their application in spintronic devices.

Bose-Einstein condensation of quasiparticles by rapid cooling.

The fundamental phenomenon of Bose-Einstein condensation has been observed in different systems of real particles and quasiparticles. The condensation of real particles is achieved through a major reduction in temperature, while for quasiparticles, a mechanism of external injection of bosons by irradiation is required. Here, we present a new and universal approach to enable Bose-Einstein condensation of quasiparticles and to corroborate it experimentally by using magnons as the Bose-particle model system. The critical point to this approach is the introduction of a disequilibrium of magnons with the phonon bath. After heating to an elevated temperature, a sudden decrease in the temperature of the phonons, which is approximately instant on the time scales of the magnon system, results in a large excess of incoherent magnons. The consequent spectral redistribution of these magnons triggers the Bose-Einstein condensation.

Bogoliubov waves and distant transport of magnon condensate at room temperature.

A macroscopic collective motion of a Bose-Einstein condensate (BEC) is commonly associated with phenomena such as superconductivity and superfluidity, often generalised by the term supercurrent. Another type of motion of a quantum condensate is second sound-a wave of condensate's parameters. Recently, we reported on the decay of a BEC of magnons caused by a supercurrent outflow of the BEC from the locally heated area of a room temperature magnetic film. Here, we present the observation of a macroscopic BEC transport mechanism related to the excitation of second sound. The condensed magnons, being propelled out of the heated area, form compact humps of BEC density, which propagate many hundreds of micrometers in the form of distinct second sound-Bogoliubov waves. This discovery advances the physics of quasiparticles and allows for the application of related transport phenomena for low-loss data transfer in magnon spintronics devices.

From Kinetic Instability to Bose-Einstein Condensation and Magnon Supercurrents.

Evolution of an overpopulated gas of magnons to a Bose-Einstein condensate and excitation of a magnon supercurrent, propelled by a phase gradient in the condensate wave function, can be observed at room temperature by means of the Brillouin light scattering spectroscopy in an yttrium iron garnet material. We study these phenomena in a wide range of external magnetic fields in order to understand their properties when externally pumped magnons are transferred towards the condensed state via two distinct channels: a multistage Kolmogorov-Zakharov cascade of the weak-wave turbulence or a one-step kinetic instability process. Our main result is that opening the kinetic instability channel leads to the formation of a much denser magnon condensate and to a stronger magnon supercurrent compared to the cascade mechanism alone.

Bottleneck Accumulation of Hybrid Magnetoelastic Bosons.

An ensemble of magnons, quanta of spin waves, can be prepared as a Bose gas of weakly interacting quasiparticles. Furthermore, the thermalization of the overpopulated magnon gas through magnon-magnon scattering processes, which conserve the number of particles, can lead to the formation of a Bose-Einstein condensate at the bottom of a spin-wave spectrum. However, magnon-phonon scattering can significantly modify this scenario and new quasiparticles are formed-magnetoelastic bosons. Our observations of a parametrically populated magnon gas in a single-crystal film of yttrium iron garnet by means of wave-vector-resolved Brillouin light scattering spectroscopy evidence a novel condensation phenomenon: A spontaneous accumulation of hybrid magnetoelastic bosonic quasiparticles at the intersection of the lowest magnon mode and a transversal acoustic wave.

Magnon transistor for all-magnon data processing.

An attractive direction in next-generation information processing is the development of systems employing particles or quasiparticles other than electrons--ideally with low dissipation--as information carriers. One such candidate is the magnon: the quasiparticle associated with the eigen-excitations of magnetic materials known as spin waves. The realization of single-chip all-magnon information systems demands the development of circuits in which magnon currents can be manipulated by magnons themselves. Using a magnonic crystal--an artificial magnetic material--to enhance nonlinear magnon-magnon interactions, we have succeeded in the realization of magnon-by-magnon control, and the development of a magnon transistor. We present a proof of concept three-terminal device fabricated from an electrically insulating magnetic material. We demonstrate that the density of magnons flowing from the transistor's source to its drain can be decreased three orders of magnitude by the injection of magnons into the transistor's gate.

Bose-Einstein condensation in an ultra-hot gas of pumped magnons.

Bose-Einstein condensation of quasi-particles such as excitons, polaritons, magnons and photons is a fascinating quantum mechanical phenomenon. Unlike the Bose-Einstein condensation of real particles (like atoms), these processes do not require low temperatures, since the high densities of low-energy quasi-particles needed for the condensate to form can be produced via external pumping. Here we demonstrate that such a pumping can create remarkably high effective temperatures in a narrow spectral region of the lowest energy states in a magnon gas, resulting in strikingly unexpected transitional dynamics of Bose-Einstein magnon condensate: the density of the condensate increases immediately after the external magnon flow is switched off and initially decreases if it is switched on again. This behaviour finds explanation in a nonlinear 'evaporative supercooling' mechanism that couples the low-energy magnons overheated by pumping with all the other thermal magnons, removing the excess heat, and allowing Bose-Einstein condensate formation.

All-linear time reversal by a dynamic artificial crystal.

The time reversal of pulsed signals or propagating wave packets has long been recognized to have profound scientific and technological significance. Until now, all experimentally verified time-reversal mechanisms have been reliant upon nonlinear phenomena such as four-wave mixing. In this paper, we report the experimental realization of all-linear time reversal. The time-reversal mechanism we propose is based on the dynamic control of an artificial crystal structure, and is demonstrated in a spin-wave system using a dynamic magnonic crystal. The crystal is switched from an homogeneous state to one in which its properties vary with spatial period a, while a propagating wave packet is inside. As a result, a linear coupling between wave components with wave vectors k≈π/a and k'=k-2π/a≈-π/a is produced, which leads to spectral inversion, and thus to the formation of a time-reversed wave packet. The reversal mechanism is entirely general and so applicable to artificial crystal systems of any physical nature.

Experimental observation of symmetry-breaking nonlinear modes in an active ring.

Solitons are large-amplitude, spatially confined wave packets in nonlinear media. They occur in a wide range of physical systems, such as water surfaces, optical fibres, plasmas, Bose-Einstein condensates and magnetically ordered media. A distinguishing feature of soliton behaviour that is common to all systems, is that they propagate without a change in shape owing to the stabilizing effect of the particular nonlinearity involved. When the propagation path is closed, modes consisting of one or several solitons may rotate around the ring, the topology of which imposes additional constraints on their allowed frequencies and phases. Here we measure the mode spectrum of spin-wave solitons in a nonlinear active ring constructed from a magnetic ferrite film. Several unusual symmetry-breaking soliton-like modes are found, such as 'Möbius' solitons, which break the fundamental symmetry of 2pi-periodicity in the phase change acquired per loop: a Möbius soliton needs to travel twice around the ring to meet the initial phase condition.