Superconducting triplet pairings and anisotropic tunneling-magnetoresistance effects in ferromagnet/superconductor/ferromagnet double-barrier junctions

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Abstract

Ferromagnetic spin valves offer the key building blocks to integrate giant- and tunneling-magnetoresistance effects into spintronics devices. Starting from a generalized Blonder--Tinkham--Klapwijk approach, we theoretically investigate the impact of interfacial Rashba and Dresselhaus spin-orbit couplings on the tunneling conductance, and thereby the tunneling-magnetoresistance characteristics, of ...

Abstract

Ferromagnetic spin valves offer the key building blocks to integrate giant- and tunneling-magnetoresistance effects into spintronics devices. Starting from a generalized Blonder--Tinkham--Klapwijk approach, we theoretically investigate the impact of interfacial Rashba and Dresselhaus spin-orbit couplings on the tunneling conductance, and thereby the tunneling-magnetoresistance characteristics, of ferromagnet/superconductor/ferromagnet spin-valve junctions embedding thin superconducting spacers between the either parallel or antiparallel magnetized ferromagnets. We focus on the unique interplay between usual electron tunnelings -- that fully determine the tunneling magnetoresistance in the normal-conducting state -- and the peculiar Andreev reflections in the superconducting state. In the presence of interfacial spin-orbit couplings, special attention needs to be paid to the spin-flip ("unconventional") Andreev-reflection process that is expected to induce superconducting triplet correlations in proximitized regions. As a transport signature of these triplet pairings, we detect conductance double-peaks around the singlet-gap energy, reflecting the competition between the singlet and the newly emerging triplet gap. We thoroughly analyze the Andreev reflections' role in connection with superconducting tunneling-magnetoresistance phenomena, and eventually unravel huge conductance and tunneling-magnetoresistance magnetoanisotropies -- easily exceeding their normal-state counterparts by several orders of magnitude -- as another experimentally accessible fingerprint of unconventional Andreev reflections. Our results provide an important contribution to establish superconducting magnetic spin valves as an essential ingredient for future superconducting-spintronics concepts.

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