Nanoscale spin rectifiers for harvesting ambient radiofrequency energy

Abstract

Radiofrequency harvesting using ambient wireless energy could be used to reduce the carbon footprint of electronic devices. However, ambient radiofrequency energy is weak (less than -20 dBm), and thermodynamic limits and high-frequency parasitic impedance restrict the performance of state-of-the-art radiofrequency rectifiers. Nanoscale spin rectifiers based on magnetic tunnel junctions have recently demonstrated high sensitivity, but suffer from a low a.c.-to-d.c. conversion efficiency (less than 1%). Here, we report a sensitive spin rectifier rectenna that can harvest ambient radiofrequency signals between -62 and -20 dBm. We also develop an on-chip co-planar waveguide-based spin rectifier array with a large zero-bias sensitivity (around 34,500 mV/mW) and high efficiency (7.81%). Self-parametric excitation driven by voltage-controlled magnetic anisotropy is a key mechanism that contributes to the performance of the spin-rectifier array. We show that these spin rectifiers can wirelessly power a sensor at a radiofrequency power of -27 dBm.

References in corpus (8)

• Vowel recognition with four coupled spin-torque nano-oscillators
• Voltage-Induced Ferromagnetic Resonance in Magnetic Tunnel Junctions
• Giant spin-torque diode sensitivity at low input power in the absence of bias magnetic field
• Spin torque resonant vortex core expulsion for an efficient radio-frequency detection scheme
• Perspectives on spintronic diodes
• Radio-Frequency Multiply-And-Accumulate Operations with Spintronic Synapses
• Low frequency non-resonant rectification in spin-diodes
• Review of Contemporary Energy Harvesting Techniques and Their Feasibility in Wireless Geophones

Cited by in corpus (3)

• A CMOS-compatible, scalable and compact magnetoelectric spin-torque microwave detector
• Metrics for spin-based computing
• Unidirectional gliding of a cycloidal spin structure by an AC magnetic field