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Updated: Jul 11, 2025

Measurement of Coherence Decay in GaMnAs Using Femtosecond Four-wave Mixing
Published on: December 3, 2013
Optically controlling the competition between spin flips and intersite spin transfer in a Heusler half-metal on
Sinéad A Ryan1, Peter C Johnsen1, Mohamed F Elhanoty2
1JILA, University of Colorado Boulder, 440 UCB, Boulder, CO 80309, USA.
Abstract:
The direct manipulation of spins via light may provide a path toward ultrafast energy-efficient devices. However, distinguishing the microscopic processes that can occur during ultrafast laser excitation in magnetic alloys is challenging. Here, we study the Heusler compound Co2MnGa, a material that exhibits very strong light-induced spin transfers across the entire M-edge. By combining the element specificity of extreme ultraviolet high-harmonic probes with time-dependent density functional theory, we disentangle the competition between three ultrafast light-induced processes that occur in Co2MnGa: same-site Co-Co spin transfer, intersite Co-Mn spin transfer, and ultrafast spin flips mediated by spin-orbit coupling. By measuring the dynamic magnetic asymmetry across the entire M-edges of the two magnetic sublattices involved, we uncover the relative dominance of these processes at different probe energy regions and times during the laser pulse. Our combined approach enables a comprehensive microscopic interpretation of laser-induced magnetization dynamics on time scales shorter than 100 femtoseconds.
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