Spintronics! Learn from the leaders of the field

This week, we'll take a look at the emerging field of spintronics, which offers many technological revolutions through manipulating the spins of electrons.

Spin is a fundamental property of matter, just like mass or charge. In the equations, this property behaves as if the particles were spinning like a top, so that's why we call it spin. Spin has the important property that it produces a magnetic field. In most materials, electrons' (and protons') spins are randomly oriented, so they all tend to cancel out. If you align those spins, though, you could create a powerful magnet. If you align local clusters of the spins, you can use encode information!

Spintronics is likely already being used in your computer's hard drive and refining the technology can lead to novel applications like quantum computers. 

In 2009, Physics World shared a series of video interviews with some of the leaders in the field. Have a look at these this week, and over the next few days we'll take a look at some of the breakthroughs and applications of spintronics!