Origin of unexpected weak Gilbert damping in the LSMO/Pt bilayer system

We investigated the Gilbert damping in La0.7Sr0.3MnO₃ (LSMO) and La0.7Sr0.3MnO₃/Pt (LSMO/Pt) heterostructures using first-principles calculations and Wannier interpolation techniques. Our work is motivated by recent experimental observations showing smaller Gilbert damping in LSMO/Pt films compared to their reference single-layer LSMO films, despite expectations of enhanced spin-pumping effects in the former. We analyze the electronic structures and transport behaviors, finding that LSMO thin films have a high spin Hall angle (|θSH|). However, in LSMO/Pt, the presence of platinum significantly increases longitudinal conductivity, reducing |θSH|. Despite the lower |θSH|, LSMO/Pt shows a notable anti-damping contribution to Gilbert damping due to a larger spin diffusion length. In contrast, pure LSMO films with large |θSH| exhibit higher damping due to efficient spin-to-charge conversion via a self-induced inverse spin Hall effect (ISHE), as reported in a recent experiment. Finally, this work demonstrates that by fine-tuning the ratio of spin Hall conductivity to longitudinal charge conductivity, it is possible to engineer heterostructures with desired spin-to-charge or charge-to-spin conversion efficiencies even with weaker spin-orbit couplings.