Quantum spin could create Uunstoppable, one-dimensional electron waves

In certain nanomaterials, electrons are able to race through custom-built roadways just one atom wide. To achieve excellent efficiency, these one-dimensional paths must be paved with absolute perfection—a single errant atom can stop racing electrons in their tracks or even launch it backwards. Unfortunately, such imperfections are inevitable.

Now, a pair of scientists from the U.S. Department of Energy's Brookhaven National Laboratory and Ludwig Maximilian University in Munich have proposed the first solution to such subatomic stoppage: a novel way to create a more robust electron wave by binding together the electron's direction of movement and its spin. The trick, as described in a paper published November 16 in Physical Review Letters and featured as an Editor's Selection ("Quantum Phase Transition and Protected Ideal Transport in a Kondo Chain"), is to exploit magnetic ions lacing the electron racetrack. The theory could drive advances in nanoscale engineering for data- and energy-storage technologies.