Recent discovered two-dimensional (2D) antiferromagnetic (AFM) van der Waals quantum materials have attracted increasing interest due to the emergent exotic physical phenomena. The spintronic properties utilizing the intrinsic AFM state in 2D antiferromagnets, however, have been rarely found. Here we show that the spin photogalvanic effect (SPGE), which has been predicted in three-dimensional (3D) antiferromagnets, can intrinsically emerge in 2D antiferromagnets for promising spintronic applications. Based on the symmetry analysis of possible AFM orders in the honeycomb lattice, we conclude suitable 2D AFM candidate materials for realizing the SPGE. We choose two experimentally synthesized 2D collinear AFM materials, monolayer MnPS₃, and bilayer CrCl₃, as representative materials to perform first-principles calculations, and find that they support sizable SPGE. The SPGE in collinear 2D AFM materials can be utilized to generate pure spin current in a contactless and ultra-fast way.

由于新兴的奇异物理现象，最近发现的二维（2D）反铁磁（AFM）范德华量子材料引起了越来越多的兴趣。然而，很少发现利用二维反铁磁体中固有的AFM状态的自旋电子性质。在这里，我们显示了在三维（3D）反铁磁体中已经预测到的自旋光电效应（SPGE）可以在2D反铁磁体中固有地出现，从而有望实现自旋电子应用。基于蜂窝晶格中可能的AFM阶的对称性分析，我们得出了用于实现SPGE的合适2D AFM候选材料。我们选择两种实验合成的二维共线AFM材料，即单层MnPS ₃和双层CrCl ₃，作为执行第一性原理计算的代表性材料，并且发现它们支持相当大的SPGE。共线2D AFM材料中的SPGE可用于以非接触且超快速的方式生成纯自旋电流。