Spin-dependent phenomena in semiconductors, topological and two-dimensional materials

Spin-dependent phenomena play a central role in materials and hold the promise for advanced applications. The Symposium will offer a prominent venue to discuss the latest achievements and findings on emerging functionalities associated to spins in semiconductors, two-dimensional and topological materials.

Scope:

The spin degree of freedom gives rise to intriguing phenomena that promise radical new directions in information and communication technologies. Low-dimensional semiconductors are under the spotlight in this context because they can unleash tremendous opportunities given their well-controlled manufacturing process, perfected through decades of nanoscale research. Presently, surfaces and interfaces are being studied as they offer an ideal playground to create synthetic spin-orbit fields that naturally sustain spin-polarized states with novel and advanced properties like efficient spin-to-charge interconversion. While semiconductor heterostructures are currently scaled down to the limit of few monolayers, the atlas of two-dimensional materials is constantly enriched, and fascinating phenomena driven by proximity effects are now on the rise. Through proximity effects, materials can become superconducting, magnetic, or topologically nontrivial. At the same time, the genuine topological nature of collective spin excitations in quantum materials, e.g. Dirac and Weyl semimetals, is tantalizing interests because of exciting opportunities ranging from the distillation of exotic quasiparticles with non-abelian statistics to the implementation of energy-saving devices. Innovative approaches are thus underway to complete the topological classification of condensed matter systems. Along this line, time-periodic perturbations - described in the framework of Floquet formalism - have been recognized to yield a dynamical evolution of the system Hamiltonian, whose energy spectrum can remarkably sustain non-trivial topological states that are simply not accessible through the steady-state Hamiltonian counterpart.

Stimulated by these exciting findings, the symposium aims at covering the latest experimental and theoretical developments in the quest to harness spin-dependent phenomena, particularly in semiconductors, topological and two-dimensional materials. The overarching goal is to provide fundamental insights on newly emerging topics and cross-fertilize research directions characterized by the concrete potential for future returns in terms of societal and economic innovation.

Hot topics to be covered:

• Materials and methods for spin injection, detection, and manipulation
• Challenges toward the practical realization of spin and topological qubits
• Diluted magnetic semiconductors
• Van der Waals materials exhibiting magnetic properties
• Experimental and theoretical aspects of out-of-equilibrium quantum matter
• Spin-dependent transport in 2D electron and hole gases
• Spin-orbit engineering and proximity-induced effects
• Opto-spintronics, spin-LEDs, spin-photodiodes, spin-lasers
• Spin galvanic, spin Hall and valley Hall effects
• Spin-dependent phenomena in semiconductor/superconductor junctions

Invited Speakers:

• M. Beard (NREL, US)
• B. A. Bernevig (Princeton Uni., US)
• C. Bonizzoni (CNR, Italy)
• M. Bowen (CNRS, France)
• J. Fabian (University of Regensburg, Germany)
• J. H. Garcia (Catalan Inst. Nanosci and Nanotech, Spain)
• E. Hankiewicz (Uni. Wuerzburg, Germany)
• A. Lanzara (Uni. California at Berkeley, US)
• X. Marie (INSA Toulouse, France)
• R. Raimondi (Uni. Roma 3, Italy)

Scientific Committee:

• M. Bibes (Unité Mixte de Physique CNRS Thales, France)
• H. Dery (University of Rochester, USA)
• T. Dietl (International Research Centre MagTop, Poland)
• V. Golovach (Donostia International Physics Center, Spain)
• A. Hirohata (University of York, UK)
• M. Jamet (INAC/Spintec and University Grenoble Alpes, France)
• M. Orlita (CNRS, France)
• D. Petti (Politecnico di Milano, Italy)
• G. Salis (IBM, Switzerland)
• A. Spiesser (National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, Japan).