Optical excitation of a forbidden magnetic resonance mode in a doped lutetium-iron-garnet film via the inverse Faraday effect

The effective magnetic field induced by a femtosecond pulse of circularly polarized light, via the inverse Faraday effect, is shown to excite a magnetic-dipole forbidden exchange spin resonance in a lutetium iron garnet. An external magnetic field cannot excite this mode, as the iron sublattices hav...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Physical review letters 2010-09, Vol.105 (10), p.107402-107402, Article 107402
Main Authors: Reid, A H M, Kimel, A V, Kirilyuk, A, Gregg, J F, Rasing, Th
Format: Article
Language:English
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Summary:The effective magnetic field induced by a femtosecond pulse of circularly polarized light, via the inverse Faraday effect, is shown to excite a magnetic-dipole forbidden exchange spin resonance in a lutetium iron garnet. An external magnetic field cannot excite this mode, as the iron sublattices have the same gyromagnetic ratio and no net torque can be applied between them. However, since the sublattices have different magneto-optical susceptibilities, the inverse Faraday effect induces different effective fields on different iron sites, allowing excitation.
ISSN:0031-9007
1079-7114
DOI:10.1103/physrevlett.105.107402