Giant spin Hall effect in AB-stacked MoTe₂/WSe₂ bilayers

The spin Hall effect (SHE), in which an electrical current generates a transverse spin current, plays an important role in spintronics for the generation and manipulation of spin-polarized electrons. The phenomenon originates from spin-orbit coupling. In general, stronger spin-orbit coupling favours larger SHEs but shorter spin relaxation times and diffusion lengths. However, correlated magnetic materials often do not support large SHEs. Achieving large SHEs, long-range spin transport and magnetism simultaneously in a single material is attractive for spintronics applications but has remained a challenge. Here we demonstrate a giant intrinsic SHE coexisting with ferromagnetism in AB-stacked MoTe2/WSe2 moire bilayers by direct magneto-optical imaging. Under moderate electrical currents with density <1 A m(-1), we observe spin accumulation on transverse sample edges that nearly saturates the spin density. We also demonstrate long-range spin Hall transport and efficient non-local spin accumulation that is limited only by the device size (about 10 & mu;m). The gate dependence shows that the giant SHE occurs only near the interaction-driven Chern insulating state. At low temperatures, it emerges after the quantum anomalous Hall breakdown. Our results demonstrate moire engineering of Berry curvature and electronic correlation for potential spintronics applications. A giant spin Hall effect with long spin diffusion length and coexisting with ferromagnetism is observed in AB-stacked MoTe2/WSe2 moire hetero-bilayers.