Query: fundamentals of spintronics

Candidate papers:

abstract: Spintronics, or spin electronics, involves the study of active control and manipulation of spin degrees of freedom in solid state systems. This article reviews the current status of this subject, including both recent advances and well established results. The primary focus is on the basic physical principles underlying the generation of carrier spin polarization, spin dynamics, and spin polarized transport in semiconductors and metals. Spin transport differs from charge transport in that spin is a nonconserved quantity in solids due to spin orbit and hyperfine coupling. The authors discuss in detail spin decoherence mechanisms in metals and semiconductors. Various theories of spin injection and spin polarized transport are applied to hybrid structures relevant to spin based devices and fundamental studies of materials properties. Experimental work is reviewed with the emphasis on projected applications, in which external electric and magnetic fields and illumination by light will be used to control spin and charge dynamics to create new functionalities not feasible or ineffective with conventional electronics.
author_names: Igor Zutic

Jaroslav Fabian

Sankar Das Sarma
title: Spintronics: Fundamentals and applications
year: 2004

abstract: A revolution in electronics is in view, with the contemporary evolution of the two novel disciplines of spintronics and molecular electronics. A fundamental link between these two fields can be established using molecular magnetic materials and, in particular, single molecule magnets. Here, we review the first progress in the resulting field, molecular spintronics, which will enable the manipulation of spin and charges in electronic devices containing one or more molecules. We discuss the advantages over more conventional materials, and the potential applications in information storage and processing. We also outline current challenges in the field, and propose convenient schemes to overcome them.
author_names: Lapo Bogani

Wolfgang Wernsdorfer
title: Molecular spintronics using single molecule magnets.
venue: Nature materials
year: 2008

abstract: This review describes a new paradigm of electronics based on the spin degree of freedom of the electron. Either adding the spin degree of freedom to conventional charge based electronic devices or using the spin alone has the potential advantages of nonvolatility, increased data processing speed, decreased electric power consumption, and increased integration densities compared with conventional semiconductor devices. To successfully incorporate spins into existing semiconductor technology, one has to resolve technical issues such as efficient injection, transport, control and manipulation, and detection of spin polarization as well as spin polarized currents. Recent advances in new materials engineering hold the promise of realizing spintronic devices in the near future. We review the current state of the spin based devices, efforts in new materials fabrication, issues in spin transport, and optical spin manipulation.
author_names: Stuart A Wolf

David D Awschalom

Robert A Buhrman

J M Daughton

Stephan von Molnar

Michael L Roukes

Almadena Yu Chtchelkanova

Daryl M Treger
title: Spintronics: A Spin Based Electronics Vision for the Future
venue: Science
year: 2001

abstract: Spintronics refers commonly to phenomena in which the spin of electrons in a solid state environment plays the determining role. In a more narrow sense spintronics is an emerging research field of electronics: spintronics devices are based on a spin control of electronics, or on an electrical and optical control of spin or magnetism. This review presents selected themes of semiconductor spintronics, introducing important concepts in spin transport, spin injection, Silsbee Johnson spin charge coupling, and spindependent tunneling, as well as spin relaxation and spin dynamics. The most fundamental spin dependent nteraction in nonmagnetic semiconductors is spin orbit coupling. Depending on the crystal symmetries of the material, as well as on the structural properties of semiconductor based heterostructures, the spin orbit coupling takes on different functional forms, giving a nice playground of effective spin orbit Hamiltonians. The effective Hamiltonians for the most relevant classes of materials and heterostructures are derived here from realistic electronic band structure descriptions. Most semiconductor device systems are still theoretical concepts, waiting for experimental demonstrations. A review of selected proposed, and a few demonstrated devices is presented, with detailed description of two important classes: magnetic resonant tunnel structures and bipolar magnetic diodes and transistors. In most cases the presentation is of tutorial style, introducing the essential theoretical formalism at an accessible level, with case study like illustrations of actual experimental results, as well as with brief reviews of relevant recent achievements in the field.
author_names: Jaroslav Fabian

Alex Matos-Abiague

Christian Ertler

Peter Stano

Igor Zutic
title: Semiconductor Spintronics
year: 2007

abstract: We review recent progress made in the field of semiconductor spintronics, a branch of semiconductor electronics where both charge and spin degrees of freedom play an important role in realizing unique functionalities. We first describe the new spin dependent phenomena found in semiconductors including carrier induced ferromagnetism in III V compounds, followed by an account of our current understanding of such spin dependent phenomena. Then we summarize the challenges the semiconductor spintronics has to meet in order for it to be a success as "electronics"
author_names: Hiroyuki Akinaga

Hideo Ohno
title: Semiconductor spintronics
year: 2002

author_names: Dante Gatteschi
title: RSC_CS_C1CS15047B 1..20
year: 2011

abstract: In the past ten years we have witnessed a revival of, and subsequent rapid expansion in, the research on zinc oxide (ZnO) as a semiconductor. Being initially considered as a substrate for GaN and related alloys, the availability of high quality large bulk single crystals, the strong luminescence demonstrated in optically pumped lasers and the prospects of gaining control over its electrical conductivity have led a large number of groups to turn their research for electronic and photonic devices to ZnO in its own right. The high electron mobility, high thermal conductivity, wide and direct band gap and large exciton binding energy make ZnO suitable for a wide range of devices, including transparent thin film transistors, photodetectors, light emitting diodes and laser diodes that operate in the blue and ultraviolet region of the spectrum. In spite of the recent rapid developments, controlling the electrical conductivity of ZnO has remained a major challenge. While a number of research groups have reported achieving p type ZnO, there are still problems concerning the reproducibility of the results and the stability of the p type conductivity. Even the cause of the commonly observed unintentional n type conductivity in as grown ZnO is still under debate. One approach to address these issues consists of growing high quality single crystalline bulk and thin films in which the concentrations of impurities and intrinsic defects are controlled. In this review we discuss the status of ZnO as a semiconductor. We first discuss the growth of bulk and epitaxial films, growth conditions and their influence on the incorporation of native defects and impurities. We then present the theory of doping and native defects in ZnO based on density functional calculations, discussing the stability and electronic structure of native point defects and impurities and their influence on the electrical conductivity and optical properties of ZnO. We pay special attention to the possible causes of the unintentional n type conductivity, emphasize the role of impurities, critically review the current status of p type doping and address possible routes to controlling the electrical conductivity in ZnO. Finally, we discuss band gap engineering using MgZnO and CdZnO alloys.
author_names: Anderson Janotti

Chris G van de Walle
title: Fundamentals of zinc oxide as a semiconductor
year: 2009

abstract: High volume information processing and communications devices are at present based on semiconductor devices, whereas information storage devices rely on multilayers of magnetic metals and insulators. Switching within information processing devices is performed by the controlled motion of small pools of charge, whereas in the magnetic storage devices information storage and retrieval is performed by reorienting magnetic domains (although charge motion is often used for the final stage of readout) Semiconductor spintronics offers a possible direction towards the development of hybrid devices that could perform all three of these operations, logic, communications and storage, within the same materials technology. By taking advantage of spin coherence it also may sidestep some limitations on information manipulation previously thought to be fundamental. This article focuses on advances towards these goals in the past decade, during which experimental progress has been extraordinary.
author_names: David D Awschalom

Michael E Flatte
title: Challenges for semiconductor spintronics
year: 2007

abstract: Traditional studies that combine spintronics and superconductivity have mainly focused on the injection of spin polarized quasiparticles into superconducting materials. However, a complete synergy between superconducting and magnetic orders turns out to be possible through the creation of spin triplet Cooper pairs, which are generated at carefully engineered superconductor interfaces with ferromagnetic materials. Currently, there is intense activity focused on identifying materials combinations that merge superconductivity and spintronics to enhance device functionality and performance. The results look promising: it has been shown, for example, that superconducting order can greatly enhance central effects in spintronics such as spin injection and magnetoresistance. Here, we review the experimental and theoretical advances in this field and provide an outlook for upcoming challenges in superconducting spintronics.
author_names: Jacob Linder

Jason W A Robinson
title: Superconducting Spintronics
year: 2015

abstract: Electrons have a charge and a spin, but until recently, charges and spins have been considered separately. In conventional electronics, the charges are manipulated by electric fields but the spins are ignored. Other classical technologies, magnetic recording, for example, are using the spin but only through its macroscopic manifestation, the magnetization of a ferromagnet. This picture started to change in 1988 when the discovery Baibich et al. 1988; Binash et al. 1989 of the giant magnetoresistance GMR of the magnetic multilayers opened the way to an efficient control of the motion of the electrons by acting on their spin through the orientation of a magnetization. This rapidly triggered the development of a new field of research and technology, today called spintronics and, like the GMR, exploiting the influence of the spin on the mobility of the electrons in ferromagnetic materials. Actually, the influence of the spin on the mobility of the electrons in ferromagnetic metals, first suggested by Mott 1936 had been experimentally demonstrated and theoretically described in my Ph.D. thesis almost 20 years before the discovery of 1988. The GMR was the first step on the road of the exploitation of this influence to control an electrical current. Its application to the read heads of hard disks greatly contributed to the fast rise in the density of stored information and led to the extension of the hard disk technology to consumer's electronics. Then, the development of spintronics revealed many other phenomena related to the control and manipulation of spin currents. Today this field of research is expanding considerably, with very promising new axes like the phenomena of spin transfer, spintronics with semiconductors, molecular spintronics, or single electron spintronics.
author_names: Albert Fert
title: Nobel Lecture: Origin, development, and future of spintronics
year: 2008