Measuring Spin One Atom at a Time

The spin of an atom might one day store information at the smallest scales conceivable. To realize this goal, researchers need to be able to control the effect that chemical environments have on an atom’s spin. A new experiment employs electron microscopy to probe the spin state of individual metal atoms bound within a sheet of graphene. The results show that atoms bound to certain defects reside in a high-spin state that is better suited for storing information.