Conceptual design of spin wave logic gates based on a Mach-Zehnder-type spin wave interferometer for universal logic functions

We present conceptual designs of an emerging class of logic gates, including NOT, NOR, and NAND, that use traveling spin waves (SWs) in the gigahertz range and that are based on a Mach-Zehnder-type SW (MZSW) interferometer. In this MZSW interferometer, logical input and output signals are achievable by the application of currents in order to control the phases that are accumulated by propagating SWs and by either destructive or constructive SW interference, respectively. In this article, the operation mechanism underlying a NOT gate function using a single MZSW interferometer is described and demonstrated numerically. The MZSW interferometer can itself become a NOT gate and be combined in its parallel and serial configurations to form NAND and NOR gates, respectively, which represent emerging classes of universal logic functions for microwave information signal processing. (C) 2008 American Institute of Physics.