High Spin Injection Efficiency Research Articles

Magnetic tunnel junction based on bilayer LaI2 as perfect spin filter device

The discovery of van der Waals intrinsic magnets has expanded the possibilities of realizing spintronics devices. We investigate the transmission, tunneling magnetoresistance ratio, and spin injection efficiency of bilayer LaI2 using a combination of first-principles calculations and the non-equilibrium Green’s function method. Multilayer graphene electrodes are employed to build a magnetic tunnel junction with bilayer LaI2 as ferromagnetic barrier. The magnetic tunnel junction turns out to be a perfect spin filter device with an outstanding tunneling magnetoresistance ratio of 653% under a bias of 0.1 V and a still excellent performance in a wide bias range. In combination with the obtained high spin injection efficiency this opens up great potential from the application point of view.

Pure Spin Transport in YIG Films with Amorphous‐to‐Crystalline Transformation

AbstractMagnetic insulators, especially Y3Fe5O12 (YIG), are considered promising candidates for spin‐based device applications due to their ultralow damping, high spin injection efficiency, and long‐distance spin propagation. However, these intriguing features are widely studied based on crystallization YIG films. Pure spin phenomena, like spin transport in YIG films with structural evolution, remain unclear. Herein, pure spin transportation is systematically investigated in the sandwich structure formed by YIG, the inserted layer‐nominal YIG (n‐YIG) with a varied crystalline structure and heavy metal Platinum (Pt). By applying ferromagnetic resonance (FMR)‐driven inverse spin Hall effect (ISHE) measurement, the detected ISHE voltage signal presented a strong correlation with the thickness of n‐YIG and its crystalline phase. A significant increasement in spin transportation is obtained for the crystallized n‐YIG via a high‐temperature annealing. These results demonstrate that pure spin current is transported availably in the structural evolution of YIG films. Furthermore, the element‐specific X‐ray absorption spectroscopy (XAS) and X‐ray magnetic circular dichroism (XMCD) spectra on the n‐YIG films showed a distinction for the crystallized n‐YIG which indicates that the spin propagation is correlated to its magnetic order. These findings are instructive for low‐dissipation spin‐based devices.

Large tunneling magnetoresistance and its high bias stability in Weyl half-semimetal based lateral magnetic tunnel junctions

Magnetic tunnel junctions (MTJs) based on novel states of two-dimensional (2D) magnetic materials will significantly improve the value of the tunneling magnetoresistance (TMR) ratio. However, most 2D magnetic materials exhibit low critical temperatures, limiting their functionality to lower temperatures rather than room temperature. Moreover, most MTJs experience the decay of TMR ratio at large bias voltages within a low spin injection efficiency (SIE). Here, we construct a series of MTJs with Weyl half-semimetal (WHSM, e.g. MnSiS3, MnSiSe3, and MnGeSe3 monolayers) as the electrodes and investigate the spin-dependent transport properties in these kind of lateral heterojunctions by employing density functional theory combined with non-equilibrium Green’s function method. We find that an ultrahigh TMR (∼109%) can be obtained firmly at a small bias voltage and maintains a high SIE even at a large bias voltage, and MnSiSe3 monolayer is predicted to exhibit a high critical temperature. Additionally, we reveal that the same structure allows for the generation of fully spin-polarized photocurrent, irrespective of the polarization angle. These findings underscore the potential of WHSMs as candidate materials for high-performance spintronic devices.

Performance analysis of fluorinated silicene based magnetic tunnel junction

Two-dimensional material based Spintronic devices are considered to be the promising next generation nano-electronic devices due to their low power, high speed and enhanced data storage capabilities. In this work, firstly we have investigated the effect of fluorination on the electronic/structural properties of zigzag/armchair silicene. Next, we have modelled a magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) device consisting of CrO2 electrodes and fluorine passivated armchair silicene nanoribbon as scattering region. The spin dependent transport properties are calculated via first principles calculations combined with non-equilibrium Green's function formalism. The modeled MTJ device shows very large magnetoresistance as compared to the state of art reported devices and high spin injection efficiency. The spin-dependent transmission spectrum and density of states were calculated to elucidate the obtained transport characteristics.

Formation of Ohmic contacts between ferromagnetic Cr2Ge2Te6 and two-dimensional metals

As a ferromagnetic semiconductor, two-dimensional (2D) Cr2Ge2Te6 holds significant implications for electronic and spintronic devices. To achieve 2D electronics, it is essential to integrate Cr2Ge2Te6 with 2D electrodes to form Schottky-barrier-free Ohmic contacts with enhanced carrier injection efficiency. Herein, by using first-principles calculations based on density-functional theory, we systematically investigate the structural, energetic, electronic and magnetic properties of 2D heterojunctions by combining Cr2Ge2Te6 with a series of 2D metals, including graphene, ZrCl, NbS2, TaS2, TaSe2, Zn3C2, Hg3C2, and Zr2N. Results show that NbS2, TaS2, TaSe2, Zn3C2, Hg3C2, and Zr2N form Ohmic contacts with Cr2Ge2Te6, in contrast to graphene and ZrCl that exhibit a finite Schottky barrier. By examining the tunneling barriers and Fermi level shift, we reveal that the heterojunctions with Zn3C2 and Hg3C2 as electrodes exhibit advantages of both high electron injection efficiency and spin injection efficiency, for which an apparent decrease of the magnetic moment of Cr atoms in Cr2Ge2Te6 can be observed. These findings not only provide physical insights into the role of interfacial interaction in regulating the physical properties of 2D heterojunctions, but also pave way for the development of high-performance spintronic nanodevices for practical implementation.

Realization of High Spin Injection Through Chiral Molecules and Its Application in Logic Device

Achieving highly efficient spin injection has been a challenging problem for a long time in spin logic devices. The chiral-induced spin selectivity (CISS) effect could induce spin polarization of electron transmission by chiral structure, providing a promising solution to resolve the above bottleneck. In this work, the significant CISS effect by self-assembled chiral organic molecules with helical structure was achieved on the copper (Cu) substrate covered with gold (Au) layer. We find that the spin polarization induced by the chiral molecules is more than 80%. Serving as an ultra efficient spin filter, the chiral organic molecules is demonstrated to be an effective way to generate pure spin currents and achieve highly efficient spin injection without ferromagnetic electrodes or external magnetic field. Based on these properties, a CISS based reconfigurable logic device is proposed. Due to the high spin injection efficiency, this CISS based device can realize 6 different logic operations with low energy consumption (1.2 pJ) and high speed (3.6 ns).

First Principle Study of Spin Tunneling Current Under Field Effect in Magnetic Tunnel Junction for Possible Application in STT-RAM

A first principle analysis of Fe/MgO/Fe magnetic tunnel junction (MTJ) having gate voltage over insulated barrier region (MgO) is presented. Because of different work functions of gate and barrier materials, transfer of density of states (DOS) in forbidden energy gap of MgO is found above Fermi energy due to Schottky effect. It is reported that diffused DOS allows high tunneling of majority channel current because of less interference of <inline-formula xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink"> <tex-math notation="LaTeX">${\Delta _{{1}}}$ </tex-math></inline-formula> symmetry of Bloch states with evanescent states in barrier. It shows high spin injection efficiency 0.9928, 0.9959, and 0.9871 with tunnel magneto resistance (TMR) ratios 1743.30%, 1450.06%, and 572.62% at gate voltages 1–3 V, respectively, with left and right electrodes at 0.5 V. Present work gives a basis for using MTJs as three terminal devices in magnetic random access memory (MRAM) applications.

Room temperature giant magnetoresistance in half-metallic Cr2C based two-dimensional tunnel junctions.

Two-dimensional (2D) magnetic materials inherit enormous potential to revolutionize next-generation spintronic technology. The majority of prior investigations using 2D ferromagnet-based tunnel junctions have shown encouraging tunnel magnetoresistance (TMR) at low temperatures. Using first-principles-based calculations, here we investigate the magnetic properties of commercially available Cr2C crystals at their monolayer limit and reveal their half metallicity properties far beyond room temperature. We then design hetero-multilayer structures combining Cr2C with graphene and hexagonal boron nitride (h-BN) and report their magnetoresistance using spin-polarized quantum transport calculations. While graphene based devices, adsorbed on the metal contact, reveal a very high TMR (1200%), it can be further increased to 1500% by changing the barrier layer to h-BN. The dependence of TMR on the number of barrier layers and different metallic electrode materials (Ti, Ag, and Au) are also studied. Our investigation suggests that Cr2C based spin valves can serve as the perfect building blocks for room temperature all-2D spintronic devices.

Spin Hall Effect-based Nonvolatile Flip Flop for Fine-grained Power Gating

This paper presents a nonvolatile flip flop (NVFF) for fine-grained power gating with data retention. The proposed NVFF exploits the spin Hall effect (SHE) for low-power and highspeed data backup operations. In order to evaluate the performance of the proposed NVFF, a simulation framework was used that consists of a SPICE circuit simulator and a Landau-Lifshitz-Gilbert solver. This work investigates the effect of process variation on the backup-and-restore operations, and shows that the proposed NVFF can achieve 5ns backup and 2ns restore operations even under process variations in the transistor and spin Hall device. Compared to the conventional spin transfer torque–based NVFF, the proposed NVFF improves the break-even time by more than three times because of the high spin injection efficiency of SHE and the simple single-phase backup mechanism.

Achieving large and nonvolatile tunable magnetoresistance in organic spin valves using electronic phase separated manganites

Tailoring molecular spinterface between novel magnetic materials and organic semiconductors offers promise to achieve high spin injection efficiency. Yet it has been challenging to achieve simultaneously a high and nonvolatile control of magnetoresistance effect in organic spintronic devices. To date, the largest magnetoresistance (~300% at T = 10 K) has been reached in tris-(8-hydroxyquinoline) aluminum (Alq3)-based organic spin valves (OSVs) using La0.67Sr0.33MnO3 as a magnetic electrode. Here we demonstrate that one type of perovskite manganites, i.e., a (La2/3Pr1/3)5/8Ca3/8MnO3 thin film with pronounced electronic phase separation (EPS), can be used in Alq3-based OSVs to achieve a large magnetoresistance (MR) up to 440% at T = 10 K and a typical electrical Hanle effect as the Hallmark of the spin injection. The contactless magnetic field-controlled EPS enables us to achieve a nonvolatile tunable MR response persisting up to 120 K. Our study suggests a new route to design high performance multifunctional OSV devices using electronic phase separated manganites.

Performance Optimization of All-Spin Logic Device Based on Silver Interconnects and Asymmetric Tunneling Layer

In this paper, we propose a performance optimization scheme for all-spin logic device (ASLD); this scheme makes use of asymmetric tunneling layer to overcome the conductivity mismatch problem. Besides, for the material selection of device, this scheme makes advantage of silver as an energy efficient interconnect material to reduce the switching delay. The simulation results indicate that the high spin injection efficiency can be obtained by increasing the thickness of the transmitter-side tunneling layer or decreasing the thickness of the receive-side tunneling layer. Therefore, the structure of asymmetric tunneling layer is expected to be more effective for spin injection. Compared with the traditional interconnect that copper or aluminum is used as a channel material, the time for magnetic moment reversal and the spin current flowing into the output magnet are predicated to be optimized when silver is chosen as the channel material, which can attribute to the fact that the conductivity of silver material is larger, the spin diffusion length is longer, and the spin–orbit interaction is weaker. Meanwhile, when the critical switching current requires for the magnetization reversal is applied, the reliable working length of silver channel is significantly longer than that of copper or aluminum channel. These abovementioned results provide a new method for the performance optimization of ASLD.

Enhanced Magnetoresistance in In-Plane Monolayer MoS2 with CrO2 Electrodes

Magnetoresistance of monolayer MoS2 is reported to increase when used in in-plane configuration with CrO2 half-metal ferromagnet (HMF) electrodes. Density functional theory (DFT)- and non-equilibrium Green’s function (NEGF)-based simulations show that high magnetoresistance (MR) values of ∼860% can be achieved in in-plane monolayer MoS2 with CrO2 electrodes, which is much higher than the MR value of ∼300% for nine-layer and the MR value of ∼70% for single-layer out-of-plane MoS2 reported in Dolui et al., Phys. Rev. B 90(R), 041401 (2014) past by other researchers. High spin-injection efficiency ∼100% is also obtained at high bias voltages. High MR and perfect spin filtration suggests the importance of this configuration in spintronics applications.

Area-Efficient Nonvolatile Flip-Flop Based on Spin Hall Effect

Systems that rely on energy harvested from ambient sources are gaining increased attention due to their possible usage in low-power applications. Owing to the unreliable nature of such ambient energy sources, these systems suffer from supply voltage degradation and power interruptions. Therefore, the computational scheme for such energy-harvesting systems is divided into small incremental steps along with nonvolatile memory elements that conserve the data between subsequent power interruptions. Toward that end, we propose a new nonvolatile flip-flop (NVFF) that exhibits better energy efficiency and denser area compared to previous designs. The NVFF utilizes a single spin Hall effect-based magnetic tunnel junction (SHE-MTJ) because of its favorable device characteristics, like high spin injection efficiency and decoupled read-write paths. We also propose a new restore mechanism, wherein a CMOS inverter is used as a gain element to attain reliable restore operation with single SHE-MTJ per NVFF. A detailed device-circuit simulation, including variational analysis, proves the reliability of the proposed NVFF.

Silicene spintronics: Fe(111)/silicene system for efficient spin injection

Silicene is an emerging 2D material with advantages of high carrier mobility, compatibility with the silicon-based semiconductor industry, and the tunable gap by a vertical electrical field due to the buckling structure. In this work, we report a first-principles investigation on the spin injection system, which consists of a Fe(111)/silicene stack as the spin injector and pure silicene as the spin channel. An extremely high spin injection efficiency (SIE) close to 100% is achieved. The partial density of states of Fe layers in the Fe(111)/silicene stack shows that spin-down states dominate above the Fermi level, resulting in a negligible spin-up current and high SIE. The transmission spectra have been investigated to analyze the spin-resolved properties. The spin injection system based on silicene is promising for the efficient silicon-based spintronics devices such as switching transistors.

Synthetic hybrid Co2FeGe/Ge(Mn) superlattice for spintronics applications

Herein, we propose and provide evidence for the experimentally and theoretically promising route of exploring spintronics materials with high performance via a synthetic hybrid of half-metallic ferromagnet and diluted magnetic semiconductor. Crystalline and well-ordered [Co2FeGe/Ge(Mn)]n superlattice, which is free of secondary phase separation, were prepared by the hybridization of end members, Co2FeGe and Ge(Mn), using the molecular beam epitaxy technique. Besides comparable magnetic properties with respect to the Co2FeGe films, the superlattice sample exhibits superior properties in electric conductivity and spin polarization, thus enhancing in favor of the spin injection efficiency. These results demonstrate the high feasibility of spintronics materials with low saturation magnetization, small coercivity, high Curie temperature, and high spin injection efficiency through the proposed route in this work.

Fabrication of highly ordered Co2Fe0.4Mn0.6Si Heusler alloy films on Si substrates

The structural and magnetic properties of Si(100)/MgO/Co2Fe0.4Mn0.6Si (CFMS) Heusler alloy thin films were systematically investigated. Highly B2-ordered CFMS Heusler films with an ordering parameter of ca. 70–80% were obtained by both the insertion of a very thin Mg layer into the Si/MgO interfaces to prevent oxidation of the Si surface and the optimization of the annealing temperature for the CFMS films. The prepared CFMS films exhibited high magnetization close to that of the CFMS bulk. Such highly B2-ordered CFMS films are very useful for realizing high spin injection efficiency in Si because of the half-metallicity of the CFMS films.

Interface interaction of Co atop Bepp2 with different substrate temperatures

The interaction at organic–ferromagnetic interfaces in organic spin-valves has a considerable effect on efficient spin injection or detection. In this work, Al/Co films were deposited on the organic Bepp2 layers at two different substrate temperatures to investigate the interface interaction. The interaction including penetration, interdiffusion and chemical reaction has been studied by the surface morphology measurement, X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy combined with Argon ion etching technique and magnetic properties measurement. It was found that the interfacial penetration and chemical reaction were serious, forming plenty of holes and non-ferromagnetic metallic carbide and oxides owing to the high energy of sputtered Co atoms into the organic Bepp2 layer when depositing Co on Bepp2 layer at the substrate temperature of 24°C. However, this phenomenon weakened when lowering the temperature to −13°C. Our results show that the low substrate temperature can reduce the penetration of the top metal electrode into the organic layer and weaken the chemical reaction between the top electrode and organic layer, which could pave a way for obtaining high-spin injection and extraction efficiency in organic spin-valve devices.

Efficient Spin Injection into Graphene through a Tunnel Barrier: Overcoming the Spin-Conductance Mismatch

Employing first-principles calculations, we investigate efficiency of spin injection from a ferromagnetic (FM) electrode (Ni) into graphene and possible enhancement by using a barrier between the electrode and graphene. Three types of barriers, h-BN, Cu(111), and graphite, of various thickness (0-3 layers) are considered and the electrically biased conductance of the Ni/Barrier/Graphene junction are calculated. It is found that the minority spin transport channel of graphene can be strongly suppressed by the insulating h-BN barrier, resulting in a high spin injection efficiency. On the other hand, the calculated spin injection efficiencies of Ni/Cu/Graphene and Ni/Graphite/Graphene junctions are low, due to the spin conductance mismatch. Further examination on the electronic structure of the system reveals that the high spin injection efficiency in the presence of a tunnel barrier is due to its asymmetric effects on the two spin states of graphene.

The investigation of interface properties of FeCo/Bepp2 heterostructures

The interface has become an important issue in organic magnetic spin-valves. In this work, Si/FeCo/Ta, Si/FeCo/Bepp2/Ta, and Si/Bepp2/FeCo/Ta samples with the variation of the FeCo layer thickness were fabricated by direct-current magnetron sputtering for FeCo layers and the thermal evaporation method for Bepp2 layers. The interaction at the interfaces between the FeCo magnetic layer and Bepp2 organic layer was investigated by the traditional magnetic properties measurement and X-ray photoelectron spectroscopy with the Argon ion etching technique. The experimental results show that the interfacial reaction is strong when sputtering FeCo on Bepp2 layer due to the high energy of sputtered FeCo atoms in contrast with the weak interfacial reaction when evaporating Bepp2 on FeCo layer. Moreover, the capping layer of Ta is quite important to protect FeCo layer against oxidation from air either by direct contact or through Bepp2 layer. Our experiment is very helpful for fabricating organic spin-valves with high-spin injection efficiency.

Spin injection and detection in a graphene lateral spin valve using an yttrium-oxide tunneling barrier

We demonstrate charge and spin current transport in a graphene-based lateral spin valve using yttrium oxide (Y-O) as a tunneling barrier between graphene and a ferromagnetic electrode. A Y-O layer grown on graphene is flat, with a root-mean-square roughness of 0.17 nm, which is much lower than that of conventional barrier materials. This flatness allows the utilization of a very thin but well-defined tunneling barrier, leading to a large spin signal of ∼20 Ω and a high spin injection efficiency of 15% with a low contact resistance of ∼1 kΩ. These findings represent important progress toward the realization of graphene-based spintronics applications.