PT  - JOURNAL ARTICLE
AU  - Khokhriakov, Dmitrii
AU  - Cummings, Aron W.
AU  - Song, Kenan
AU  - Vila, Marc
AU  - Karpiak, Bogdan
AU  - Dankert, André
AU  - Roche, Stephan
AU  - Dash, Saroj P.
TI  - Tailoring emergent spin phenomena in Dirac material heterostructures
AID  - 10.1126/sciadv.aat9349
DP  - 2018 Sep 01
TA  - Science Advances
PG  - eaat9349
VI  - 4
IP  - 9
4099  - http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/9/eaat9349.short
4100  - http://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/9/eaat9349.full
SO  - Sci Adv2018 Sep 01; 4
AB  - Dirac materials such as graphene and topological insulators (TIs) are known to have unique electronic and spintronic properties. We combine graphene with TIs in van der Waals heterostructures to demonstrate the emergence of a strong proximity-induced spin-orbit coupling in graphene. By performing spin transport and precession measurements supported by ab initio simulations, we discover a strong tunability and suppression of the spin signal and spin lifetime due to the hybridization of graphene and TI electronic bands. The enhanced spin-orbit coupling strength is estimated to be nearly an order of magnitude higher than in pristine graphene. These findings in graphene-TI heterostructures could open interesting opportunities for exploring exotic physical phenomena and new device functionalities governed by topological proximity effects.