Interconversion between electron spin and other forms of angular momentum is useful for spin-based information processing. Well-studied examples of this are the conversion of photon angular momentum and rotation into ferromagnetic moment. Recently, several theoretical studies have suggested that the circular vibration of atoms work as phonon angular momentum; however, conversion between phonon angular momentum and spin-moment has yet to be demonstrated. Here, we demonstrate that the phonon angular momentum of surface acoustic wave can control the magnetization of a ferromagnetic Ni film by means of the phononic-to-electronic conversion of angular momentum in a Ni/LiNbO₃ hybrid device. The result clearly shows that the phonon angular momentum is useful for increasing the functionality of spintronic devices.

电子自旋和其他形式的角动量之间的相互转换对于基于自旋的信息处理很有用。对此进行充分研究的示例是将光子角动量和旋转转换为铁磁矩。最近，一些理论研究表明，原子的圆形振动起声子角动量的作用。然而，声子角动量与自旋矩之间的转换尚未得到证实。在这里，我们证明了表面声波的声子角动量可以通过Ni / LiNbO ₃混合装置中角动量的声子-电子转换来控制铁磁Ni膜的磁化。结果清楚地表明，声子角动量可用于增加自旋电子器件的功能。