About

Mingzhong Wu is a Professor in the Electrical and Computer Engineering department at Northeastern University, with a joint appointment in Physics. He joined the university in August 2023 and is the Director of the Cross-College Magnetics Center. His research focuses on spintronic and magnonic devices for computing, memory, and microwave applications. His group is interested in many topics in magnetics and quantum materials, including topological quantum materials, magnetic thin films, spin transport, spin torque, spin waves, and ferromagnetic resonance. Wu's work involves discovering novel magnetic and electronic phenomena and exploring their potential for next-generation microelectronic and computing technologies.

Research topics

• Physics
• Optics
• Condensed matter physics
• Materials science
• Nuclear magnetic resonance
• Quantum mechanics

Selected publications

• Effect of Nb Addition on Microstructure Evolution and Wear Resistance of Hypereutectic Fe-B Surfacing Alloy

  JOM · 2025-09-24 · 2 citations

  article
  PublisherDOI

• Propagation of Spin Waves in Doubly Periodic Magnonic Crystals

  ArXiv.org · 2025-05-13

  preprintOpen accessSenior author

  Towards the development of strategies for tailoring spin-wave band gaps in magnonic crystals, this work examines the band gap properties in a one-dimensional magnonic crystal with double periodicity. A long and narrow yttrium iron garnet (YIG) thin film strip is etched with an array of transverse groove lines separated by alternating distances, where the second distance is twice the first. This double periodicity in the magnonic crystal translates into dissimilar band gaps in the frequency domain, with the third and sixth band gaps being more pronounced than others. These band gaps are more pronounced because the corresponding wavenumbers simultaneously satisfy the Bragg scattering conditions for the periods equal to the two groove separations as well as their sum. Experimental observations are reproduced by numerical simulations. Together, the experimental and numerical results demonstrate how multiple periodicities could be an effective design parameter for creating magnonic crystals with desired band gaps.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Fast magnonic device development with inverse design

  Nature Electronics · 2025-02-25 · 1 citations

  article1st authorCorresponding
  PublisherDOI

• Effect of Nb Addition on Microstructure and Mechanical Properties of Fe-5.5 Wt% B Alloy

  SSRN Electronic Journal · 2025-01-01

  preprintOpen access
  PublisherDOI

• Modal and optimization analysis of a 12-degree-of-freedom engine mount system considering engine elasticity

  Journal of Vibroengineering · 2025-02-19

  articleOpen access1st authorCorresponding

  The multi-degree-of-freedom engine mount system presents a coupling issue that significantly impacting its vibration isolation performance. Although the optimization theories for decoupling 6-degree-of-freedom (6-DOF) and 12-degree-of-freedom (12-DOF) engine mount systems are relatively well-developed, previous studies have predominantly focused on engine response and often overlook the impact of car body vibrations. To address this gap, this article conducts an in-depth investigation into how the elasticity of the car body affects the vibration isolation performance of the engine mount system. Initially, the dynamics of the engine mount system are modeled with 6 degrees of freedom, incorporating an elastic base with 9 and 12 degrees of freedom, respectively. The study then analyzes how body elasticity influences the natural frequencies and modal shapes of the engine mount system. Subsequently, the sensitivity of the engine mount system is assessed using Isight analysis to evaluate the three directional stiffnesses of the mount. Finally, the decoupling optimization of the 12-degree-of-freedom engine mount system is performed using the NLPQL (Sequential Quadratic Programming) method. The findings indicate that: (1) considering the car body’s influence directly affects the natural characteristics and decoupling efficiency of the engine mount system; (2) body elasticity in the Z-direction has the greatest impact on the system’s vertical natural frequency; and (3) the NLPQL method effectively enhances the decoupling rate of the engine mount system.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Ferromagnetic resonance properties of multilayered (Fe ₈₀ Ga ₂₀ /B) _<i>n</i> thin films grown on LiNbO ₃ substrates

  Physical Review Applied · 2025-10-28

  articleSenior author

  Acoustically driven ferromagnetic resonance (FMR) in magnetostrictive-piezoelectric thin-film heterostructures holds significant potential for detecting weak biomagnetic signals from human physiological activity. Minimizing the FMR linewidth is crucial for such applications. This study explores FMR linewidth reduction by examining the properties of alternately sputtered multilayered magnetostrictive $(\mathrm{Fe}\mathrm{Ga}/\mathrm{B}{)}_{n}$ thin films on piezoelectric ${\mathrm{Li}\mathrm{Nb}\mathrm{O}}_{3}$ substrates, all with 20 nm thicknesses. As the number of repeating layers (n) increases from 4 to 20, the damping constant declines sharply for n = 4--8, followed by a much slower decrease for n = 8--20. In contrast, inhomogeneity line broadening exhibits a U-shaped trend. These effects collectively yield minimal FMR linewidths at n = 12 and n = 16, demonstrating that optimizing n can effectively reduce the FMR linewidth. Notably, the lowest linewidths observed are smaller than those of a cosputtered $\mathrm{Fe}\mathrm{Ga}\mathrm{B}$ film with the same composition and thickness on an identical ${\mathrm{Li}\mathrm{Nb}\mathrm{O}}_{3}$ substrate. This suggests that the multilayered approach outperforms the conventional cosputtering approach for producing low-linewidth magnetic thin films, offering insights into acoustically driven FMR-based high-sensitivity magnetic field sensing devices.

  PublisherDOI

• Propagation of spin waves in doubly periodic magnonic crystals

  Physical Review Applied · 2025-06-05 · 1 citations

  articleSenior author

  Towards the development of strategies for tailoring spin-wave band gaps in magnonic crystals, this work examines the band-gap properties in a one-dimensional magnonic crystal with double periodicity. A long and narrow yttrium iron garnet thin film strip is etched with an array of transverse groove lines separated by alternating distances, where the second distance is twice the first. This double periodicity in the magnonic crystal translates into dissimilar band gaps in the frequency domain, with the third and sixth band gaps being more pronounced than others. These band gaps are more pronounced because the corresponding wave numbers simultaneously satisfy the Bragg scattering conditions for the periods equal to the two groove separations as well as their sum. Experimental observations are reproduced by numerical simulations. Together, the experimental and numerical results demonstrate how multiple periodicities could be an effective design parameter for creating magnonic crystals with desired band gaps.

  PublisherDOI

• Tunneling current-controlled spin states in few-layer van der Waals magnets

  Nature Communications · 2024-05-01 · 15 citations

  articleOpen access

  Abstract Effective control of magnetic phases in two-dimensional magnets would constitute crucial progress in spintronics, holding great potential for future computing technologies. Here, we report a new approach of leveraging tunneling current as a tool for controlling spin states in CrI 3 . We reveal that a tunneling current can deterministically switch between spin-parallel and spin-antiparallel states in few-layer CrI 3 , depending on the polarity and amplitude of the current. We propose a mechanism involving nonequilibrium spin accumulation in the graphene electrodes in contact with the CrI 3 layers. We further demonstrate tunneling current-tunable stochastic switching between multiple spin states of the CrI 3 tunnel devices, which goes beyond conventional bi-stable stochastic magnetic tunnel junctions and has not been documented in two-dimensional magnets. Our findings not only address the existing knowledge gap concerning the influence of tunneling currents in controlling the magnetism in two-dimensional magnets, but also unlock possibilities for energy-efficient probabilistic and neuromorphic computing.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• IEEE Magnetics Society Information

  IEEE Transactions on Magnetics · 2024-01-01

  articleOpen access
  PublisherOA PDFDOI

• Electrical, optical, and magnetic properties of amorphous yttrium iron oxide thin films and consequences for non-local resistance measurements

  Journal of Applied Physics · 2023-06-08 · 2 citations

  articleOpen access

  We present magnetic characterization, charge resistivity, and optical photoluminescence measurements on amorphous yttrium iron oxide thin films (a-Y–Fe–O), with supporting comparisons to amorphous germanium (a-Ge) films. We measured magnetic properties with both SQUID magnetometry and polarized neutron reflectometry. These results not only confirm that a-Y–Fe–O is a disordered magnetic material with strong predominantly antiferromagnetic exchange interactions and a high degree of frustration, but also that it is best understood electrically as a disordered semiconductor. As with amorphous germanium, a-Y–Fe–O obeys expectations for variable-range hopping through localized electron states over a wide range of temperature. We also clarify the consequences of charge transport through such a semiconducting medium for non-local voltage measurements intended to probe spin transport in nominally insulating magnetic materials. We further compare non-local resistance measurements made with “quasi-dc” automated current reversal to ac measurements made with a lock-in amplifier. These show that the “quasi-dc” measurement has an effective ac current excitation with frequency up to approximately 22 Hz, and that this effective ac excitation can cause artifacts in these measurements including incorrect sign of the non-local resistance. This comprehensive investigation of non-local resistance measurements in a-Y–Fe–O shows no evidence of spin transport on micrometer length scales, which is contrary to our original work, and in line with more recent investigations by other groups.

  PublisherOA PDFDOI

Recent grants

• Spin Current Phenomena in Non-Collinear Antiferromagnets:From Fundamental Physics to Device Concepts

  NSF · $368k · 2019–2024

• Novel Magnetic Nano Films and Devices for Millimeter Wave Communications

  NSF · $328k · 2007–2011

• Nonlinear Spin Waves in Magnetic Films: New Concepts and Applications

  NSF · $346k · 2009–2013

• Spintronics with Yttrium Iron Garnets - From Fundamental Physics to Device Concepts

  NSF · $338k · 2012–2016

• Multi-Scale Magnonic Crystals and Fractional Schr?dinger Equation-Governed Dynamics

  NSF · $505k · 2020–2024

Frequent coauthors

• Atsufumi Hirohata

  Conference Board

  360 shared

• Ron Goldfarb

  Conference Board

  302 shared

• Nicoleta Lupu

  National Institute of Research and Development for Technical Physics

  276 shared

• Johannes Paulides

  271 shared

• Philip W. T. Pong

  269 shared

• Petru Andrei

  Conference Board

  261 shared

• John Q. Xiao

  260 shared

• Barry Zink

  Conference Board

  260 shared

Awards & honors

• Fellow, American Physical Society
• Fellow, The Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineer…
• Professor Laureate, CNS, Colorado State University (2019, 20…