Many chemical reactions are devised to create bulk materials or single molecules with well defined spin properties, such as a single-molecule magnet.
The aim of this article is to provide an outline of fields of research and development where the focus is on the properties and applications of quantum spin.
As spin is one of the fundamental quantum properties of elementary particles it is relevant for a large range of physical and chemical phenomena.
Today, researchers focus on specialized topics, such as the design and synthesis of molecular magnets or other model systems in order to understand and harness the fundamental principles behind phenomena such as the relation between magnetism and chemical reactivity as well as microstructure related mechanical properties of metals and the biochemical impact of spin (e. g. photoreceptor proteins) and spin transport.
Spintronics is probably one of the most advanced fields of spin engineering with many important inventions which can be found in end-user devices like the reading heads for magnetic hard disk drives.