Magnonic Analogue of Edelstein Effect in Antiferromagnetic Insulators


Abstract in English

We investigate the nonequilibrium spin polarization due to a temperature gradient in antiferromagnetic insulators, which is the magnonic analogue of the inverse spin-galvanic effect of electrons. We derive a linear response theory of a temperature-gradient-induced spin polarization for collinear and noncollinear antiferromagnets, which comprises both extrinsic and intrinsic contributions. We apply our theory to several noncentrosymmetric antiferromagnetic insulators, i.e., to a one-dimensional antiferromagnetic spin chain, a single layer of kagome noncollinear antiferromagnet, e.g., $text{KFe}_3(text{OH})_6(text{SO}_4)_2$, and a noncollinear breathing pyrochlore antiferromagnet, e.g., LiGaCr$_4$O$_8$. The shapes of our numerically evaluated response tensors agree with those implied by the magnetic symmetry. Assuming a realistic temperature gradient of $10 text{K}/text{mm}$, we find two-dimensional spin densities of up to $sim 10^6hbar/text{cm}^2$ and three-dimensional bulk spin densities of up to $sim 10^{14}hbar/text{cm}^3$, encouraging an experimental detection.

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