Orbital currents for efficient magnetization control

The increasing demand for faster and more energy-efficient electronics has intensified the search for advanced memory technologies. Spintronics addresses this challenge by using the angular momentum of electrons—spin and orbital—to manipulate magnetic states. Conventional spintronic devices, such as Spin-Orbit Torque MRAM (SOT-MRAM), rely on spin currents generated by the Spin Hall Effect (SHE) or Rashba-Edelstein Effect (REE), which require materials with strong spin–orbit coupling (SOC), typically heavy metals like Ta or W. Recently, there has been growing interest in orbital currents, generated by the Orbital Hall Effect (OHE) and Orbital Rashba-Edelstein Effect (OREE), which do not require high SOC. This enables the use of lighter and more abundant elements such as Ru, V, Cr, Ti, and Mn. These orbital currents can be converted into spin currents and exert torque on magnetic layers, offering a promising path toward more scalable, energy-efficient, and sustainable memory technologies, such as Orbital Torque MRAM (OT-MRAM).