Chiral charge pumping in graphene deposited on a magnetic insulator

Abstract

We demonstrate experimentally that a sizable chiral charge pumping can be achieved at room temperature in graphene/yttrium iron garnet (YIG) bilayer systems. The effect, which cannot be attributed to the ordinary spin pumping, reveals itself in the creation of a dc electric field/voltage in graphene as a response to the dynamic magnetic excitations (spin waves) in an adjacent out-of-plane magnetized YIG film. We show that the induced voltage changes its sign when the orientation of the static magnetization is reversed, clearly indicating the broken mirror reflection symmetry about the planes normal to the graphene/YIG interface. The strength of effect shows a nonmonotonous dependence on the spin-wave frequency, in agreement with the proposed theoretical model.