Ab initio spin-flip conductance of hydrogenated graphene nanoribbons: Spin-orbit interaction and scattering with local impurity spins

We calculate the spin-dependent zero-bias conductance G(sigma sigma ') in armchair graphene nanoribbons with hydrogen adsorbates employing a DFT-based ab initio transport formalism including spin-orbit interaction. We find that the spin-flip conductance G(sigma(sigma) over bar) can reach the same order of magnitude as the spin-conserving one G(sigma sigma), due to exchange-mediated spin scattering. In contrast, the genuine spin-orbit interaction appears to play a secondary role, only.