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Spontaneous Nernst coefficient of ferromagnets from the interplay of electron scattering and Berry curvature

Vittorio Basso*, Adriano Di Pietro, and Alessandro Sola

  • *Contact author: v.basso@inrim.it
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Phys. Rev. Applied 26, 014085 – Published 27 July, 2026

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1103/jryt-qwsj

Abstract

We employ the Boltzmann transport approach to derive the spontaneous Nernst coefficient for ferromagnetic metals, explicitly treating the transverse current density due to Berry curvature as a Fermi surface property. We find that the spontaneous Nernst coefficient is proportional to the inverse of the scattering time constant, implying that efficient spontaneous Nernst materials should exhibit relatively strong scattering, a stark contrast to ordinary Nernst materials. Furthermore, we establish a direct connection between the strength and sign of the spontaneous Nernst coefficient and the itinerant contribution to orbital angular momentum density arising from the Bloch bands. Finally, we construct a rigid two-band model to evaluate the thermoelectric coefficients by which we find a good agreement with the signs and orders of magnitude of the experimental coefficients of magnetic 3d transition metal ferromagnets. We finally propose some practical recipes for maximizing the spontaneous Nernst effect through electronic band structure tailoring.

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Phys. Rev. Applied 26, 014085– Published 27 July, 2026
  • Received 12 August 2025
  • Revised 23 January 2026
  • Accepted 25 June 2026
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