Surface coverage dependence of spin-to-charge current across Pt/MoS/YFeO layers via longitudinal spin Seebeck effect

Lee, W.-Y.*; Park, N.-W.*; Kang, M.-S.*; Kim, G.-S.*; Jang, H. W.*; Saito, Eiji; Lee, S.-K.*

The voltage induced by the inverse spin Hall effect (ISHE) is affected by several factors, including the spin Hall angle of the normal metal (NM), the quality and magnetic properties of the ferromagnetic material (FM), and the interface conditions between the NM and FM bilayers in longitudinal spin Seebeck effect (LSSE) measurement. Specifically, the interface conditions in NM/FM systems via LSSE devices play a crucial role in determining the efficiency of spin current injection into the NM layer. In this letter, we report a new approach to controlling the efficiency of spin current injection into a Pt layer across a Pt/YFeO (YIG) interface by surface coverage of the intermediate layer. A continuous, large-area multilayer molybdenum dichalcogenide (MoS) thin film grown by chemical vapor deposition is inserted between the Pt and YIG layers in the LSSE configuration. We found that, when the large-area multilayer MoS film was present, the measured ISHE-induced voltage and theoretically calculated spin current in the Pt/MoS/YIG trilayer increased by 510% and 470%, respectively, compared to those of a Pt/YIG bilayer. The induced voltage and spin current were very sensitive to the surface conductance, which was affected by the surface coverage of the multilayer MoS films in the LSSE measurement. Furthermore, the theoretically calculated spin current and spin mixing conductance in the trilayer geometry are in qualitatively good agreement with the experimental observations. These measurements enable us to explain the effect of the interface conditions on the spin Seebeck effect in spin transport.