Spin-Orbit Coupling & Relativistic Quantum Materials

Summer School

Speaker: See Program
Date & Time: October 22 - 25, 2015
Location: Point Grey Campus, University of British Columbia
Local Contact: Marcel Franz
Intended Audience: Graduate

Spin-Orbit Coupling & Relativistic Quantum Materials Website

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Coupling between motional and spin degrees of freedom of electrons in solids is a genuinely relativistic effect, which leads to a plethora of interesting phenomena and underlies the physics of some of the most exciting quantum materials discovered in recent decades. This includes topological insulators and superconductors, Weyl and Dirac semimetals, and various strongly correlated complex oxides, such as iridates and ruthenates. In a series of pedagogical lectures the summer school will introduce the general concept of spin-orbit coupling in atoms and in solids and then will proceed to describe various classes of materials where these effects are strongly manifested. The school is aimed at graduate students and postdocs working in both experiment and theory who possess basic background in condensed matter physics.