Session L1: Nobel Prize Session followed by Onsager Prize Session

Recent developments and perspective in spintronics

Recent developments and perspective in spintronics: A. Fert, UMR CNRS/Thales, 91767 Palaiseau and Université Paris-Sud, 91405 Orsay, France After an introduction on the fundamentals of spin transport and the discovery of GMR, I will focus on the most recent developments in spintronics. I will first describe the field of the spin transfer phenomena by reviewing experimental results on magnetic switching and generation of microwave oscillations by spin transfer. The synchronization and phase locking of a collection of STO’s (Spin Transfer Oscillators) is an example of new important problem raised by the experiments of spin transfer. I will present data on the synchronization of electrically connected STO. I will then continue the review with results on spintronics with semiconductors, molecular spintronics and spin Hall effect.\newline \newline Acknowledgements: I thanks all the coworkers of my recent works on spintronics, A. Anane[1], J. Barnas [2], A. Barthélémy [1], A. Bernand-Mantel [1], M. Bibes [1], O. Boulle [1], V.Cros [1], C.Deranlot [1], M.Elsen [1], G. Faini [3], B. Georges [1], JM.George [1], R. Giraud [3], M. Gmitra [2], J.Grollier [1], A.Hamzic [5], L. Hueso [6], H.Jaffrès [1], S. Laribi [1], A. Lemaitre [3], P. M. Levy [7], N. Mathur [6], R. Mattana [1],, F. Petroff [1], P. Seneor [1], F.Van Dau [1], A. Vaurès [1]. \newline \newline [1] Unité Mixte de Physique CNRS/Thales, Palaiseau and Université Paris Sud,Orsay, France\newline [2] Department of Physics, Adam Mickiewicz University, Poznan, Poland\newline [3] CNRS- LPN, Marcoussis, France\newline [4] IEF, Université Paris-Sud, Orsay, France\newline [5] University of Zagreb, Croatia\newline [6] Cambridge University, UK \newline [7] New York University\newline   

From spinwaves to Giant Magnetoresistance (GMR) and beyond

Standing spinwaves and surface waves in layered magnetic structures can be used for the detection and quantitative evaluation of interlayer exchange coupling (IEC). Using this method antiferromagnetic IEC has been found in Fe/Cr/Fe layered structures. This was applied to switch the alignment of the magnetizations of the Fe films in an external field from antiparallel to parallel whereby the Giant Magnetoresistance (GMR) effect was discovered. Currently the interest focusses on ``Current Induced Magnetic Switching" (CIMS) which can be understood as inverse GMR effect. For all three effects, IEC, GMR and CIMS there are many interesting applications.   

Lars Onsager Prize Talk: Quantum fluids: from liquid helium to cold atoms

The study of quantum liquids has led to ideas and concepts of broad applicability. I shall illustrate this by examples from the physics of liquid helium-3, heavy-fermion compounds, quark-gluon plasmas and cold atomic gases.   

Lars Onsager Prize Talk: Stepping through forty years of quantum fluids

This talk will trace milestones in quantum fluids from dilute solutions of He-3 in He-4, to superfluids in neutron stars, to cold atoms.   

Lars Onsager Prize Talk: A New Challenge for Cold Atom Physics: Achieving the Strongly Correlated Regimes for Cold Atoms in Optical Lattices.

Cold atoms in optical lattices show great promise to generate a whole host of new strongly correlated states and to emulate many theoretical models for strongly interacting electronic systems. However, to reach these strongly correlated regimes, we need to reach unprecedented low temperatures within current experimental settings. To achieve this, it is necessary to remove considerable amount of entropy from the system. Here, we point out a general principle for removing entropies of quantum gases in optical lattices which will allow one to reach some extraordinarily low temperature scales.