****Nontechnical abstract**** Innovations in materials are central to enabling new technology and enhancing human well-being in a changing world. Discovery of new materials and the novel phenomena they engender lies at the heart of many of these innovations. The emerging materials and their associated phenomena are increasingly complex, so success at this endeavor requires the coordinated effort of a team of scientists and technologists that bring a range of talents to bear. The Ohio State University Center for Emergent Materials (CEM) realizes innovative science and complex materials discovery by engaging researchers from diverse backgrounds and disciplines in an enabling and collaborative environment. The Center is creating novel materials that build on, and control, opposing, but delicately balanced tendencies and internal pressures within carefully constructed materials to create new phases of matter and produce novel magnetism. Features of single-atom-thick materials created by Center researchers are tuned by adding selected atoms to their surfaces in controlled patterns that produce remarkable one-dimensional interfaces whose properties are under exploration. The Center is a leader in using the magnetic properties of electrons to transmit magnetic information using innovative methods based on flow of heat and coherent motions of arrays of magnetic electrons. The Center is using innovative approaches to ensure that its scientific endeavors benefit from the contributions of women and underrepresented groups. The training and education of young scientists is integrated into the Center's scientific research improving its ability to recruit, retain and teach diverse undergraduates, graduates, and postdoctoral researchers.

Technical Abstract

The Center is creating novel materials that tune the delicate interplay between interactions arising from electronic charge and interactions between an electron's spin and its motion to enable topological phases, quantum phase transitions and novel magnetism. This tuning will be achieved by using heavier elements where spin interacts strongly with electronic motion and will exploit modification of the material's chemistry, structure and internal pressures imposed by a neighboring material. The Center is also creating new, single-atom thick 2D materials composed of heavier atoms that allow tuning of electronic properties by covalently attaching atoms on the layer's surface to enable novel electronic phases and spin physics. Delicately controlled spatial patterning of these sheets creates the exciting possibility of novel 1D interfaces. The Center will open a new frontier in transmission of spin by pushing into the nonlinear regime in which the characteristic properties depend on how hard spins are driven by studying the behavior of these currents passing through materials whose magnetism is spatially modulated. This nonlinear response could allow spin transport science to move beyond diffusive spin currents to enable novel approaches to spin manipulation and control for next generation spintronics. Undergrad labs created by Center faculty that are based on their research topics help prepare the next scientific generation. Center faculty are participants in the newly established and externally funded Masters-to-Ph.D. minority Bridge Program that increases the pool of qualified faculty candidates.

Agency
National Science Foundation (NSF)
Institute
Division of Materials Research (DMR)
Type
Cooperative Agreement (Coop)
Application #
1420451
Program Officer
Miriam Deutsch
Project Start
Project End
Budget Start
2014-11-01
Budget End
2021-10-31
Support Year
Fiscal Year
2014
Total Cost
$18,549,034
Indirect Cost
Name
Ohio State University
Department
Type
DUNS #
City
Columbus
State
OH
Country
United States
Zip Code
43210