A message from Andrii

A message from Andrii

This year is a very important one for the group, since the establishment period associated with the development of methodology and specialized training of PhD students is over and the group is functioning in its normal rhythms. The atmosphere in the group is filled with the enthusiasm and scientific curiosity of young talented researchers, mixed with the numerous events in the after-work hours. The great news is that Kristýna Davídková joined us as a PhD student in September and Khrystyna Levchenko was awarded a prestigious FWF ESPRIT project and joined the team of NanoMag PIs. Remarkable synergy is achieved by merging our expertise with the complementary skills and knowledge of our associates and friends. Among the closest colleagues, we continue the collaboration with Qi Wang, who left our group to start his own group on magnonics at Huazhong University of Science and Technology in Wuhan, and with Philipp Pirro and his team in Kaiserslautern. The nanostructuring as well as several experimental studies are carried out in close contact with the group of Michal Urbánek (CEITEC, Brno). The amazing numerical support is provided by the group of Dieter Suess at our faculty, many research directions are tackled jointly. Analytical theory support is provided, among others, by Roman Verba from the Institute of Magnetism, Kyiv. And our main material for studying spin waves is, as before, the fantastic LPE YIG grown by Carsten Dubs in Jena. Another exciting news is that together with Sergej Demokritov from Münster and Gunther Springholz & Andreas Ney from Linz we have received FWF-DFG funding to start spin wave investigations in new and challenging 4f paramagnetic materials.

Scientifically, it has been a productive year. Experimental studies of deeply nonlinear excitation of self-normalized short spin waves in out-of-plane YIG nanowaveguides were published in the prestigious journal Science Advances. This phenomenon opens access to a number of important data processing building blocks that we are currently working on. Our first paper on nanoscale spin-wave transport at mK temperatures was successfully published by Sebastian Knauer in the JAP special issue on Magnonics. Our results show that the developed fabrication and measurement methods enable the realization of integrated magnonic quantum nanotechnologies at millikelvin temperatures. Many results are published jointly with other teams: The first zero-offset magnetic field sensor has been proposed and numerically tested by Markus Grattringer under the supervision of Dieter Suess; David Breitbach from Kaiserslutern has demonstrated stimulated amplification of propagating magnons by non-equilibrium overheated magnon gas; Silvia Casulleras from Innsbruck has theoretically proposed the inverse design of spin-wave pulses under the supervision of Carlos Gonzalez-Ballestero; jointly with the group of Fabrizio Riente from Torino we developed a numerical model for 32-bit magnonic ripple-carry adders.

The SuperSpin Lab subgroup, led by Oleksandr Dobrovolskiy, had a very fruitful year. Highlights include an approach for vortex counting and velocimetry using slitted superconducting films and steering of vortex jets in superconductor 3D nanoarchitectures. Within the international FWF-DFG project CurviMag (Partners: Michael Huth, Goethe University Frankfurt am Main, Denys Makarov and Attila Kakay, HZDR), the first BLS measurements of spin waves in direct-write 3D nanoconduits have been performed. The collaboration with Markus Arndt (University of Vienna) has been marked with the ground-breaking single-molecule detection in slow protein ion beams using superconducting strips as quantum sensors. Within the international FWF-NCN-GAGR project FluMag (Partners: Michal Urbánek, CEITEC, Brno and Jarosław Kłos, University of Poznan), FMR frequency shifts due to the superconductor layer have been experimentally observed. A new collaboration has been launched with the group of Stephane Mangin (Nancy-Université) on MgB₂ films as prospective materials for single-photon detectors.

As always, Pedro del Real, our Administrative Assistant, is doing a great job in communicating science to the general public. For example, together with a team of experts, Pedro has successfully developed an online comic about magnonics, which pulls back the curtain on the usual life of researchers. We have successfully recorded and published on YouTube a lecture course on Magnonics, hoping that it will simplify the first steps of young researchers all over the world. Pedro also did a great job with summer interns who learned many important and practical skills.

On a darker note, we continue to provide all possible support to Ukrainian researchers who are in difficult circumstances due to the Russian invasion. In particular, we were pleased to participate in the successful implementation of the IEEE MagSoc program "Magnetism for Ukraine 2023", which supported 43 magnetic researchers this year. It was also a great pleasure to welcome 25 participants of the final round of the All-Ukrainian Science Olympiad 2023 in our group. We thank Prof. Dr. Michael Eichmaier from the Faculty of Mathematics for this initiative.

Many other issues could be discussed here, but now it is time for me to wish you and your closest all the best for next year and happy Holidays!

Sincerely yours,
Andrii