Spin drift and spin diffusion currents in semiconductors

On the basis of a spin drift-diffusion model, we show how the spin current is composed and find that spin drift and spin diffusion contribute additively to the spin current, where the spin diffusion current decreases with electric field while the spin drift current increases, demonstrating that the extension of the spin diffusion length by a strong field does not result in a significant increase in spin current in semiconductors owing to the competing effect of the electric field on diffusion. We also find that there is a spin drift-diffusion crossover field for a process in which the drift and diffusion contribute equally to the spin current, which suggests a possible method of identifying whether the process for a given electric field is in the spin drift or spin diffusion regime. Spin drift-diffusion crossover fields for GaAs are calculated and are found to be quite small. We derive the relations between intrinsic spin diffusion length and the spin drift-diffusion crossover field of a semiconductor for different electron statistical regimes. The findings resulting from this investigation might be important for semiconductor spintronics.     

Tunable Spin Current Through a Vibrating Molecular Quantum Dot with Spin Bias and Spin Flip Scattering

By applying the Lang-Firsov canonical transformation and the Keldysh nonequilibrium Green’s function approach, the effect of the spin-flip scattering on the spin current through a vibrating molecular quantum dot with spin bias is theoretically investigated. We can obtain the spin current from the output terminal, and find that the sign of the spin current can be changed by adjusting the spin-flip strength, and a pure spin current can be generated via the charge bias and the spin bias. In the presence of the electron-phonon interaction, the positions of the current peaks are shifted and the spin current is remarkably suppressed, which leads to the Franck-Condon blockade. Furthermore, it is found that the competition between the EPI and the spin-flip scattering jointly determines the character of the spin current. These results offer us a way to manipulate the spin current in the spin current setup. The proposed device should be realizable with use of the present technology at low temperature.     

Spin drift and spin diffusion currents in semiconductors

Abstract

On the basis of a spin drift-diffusion model, we show how the spin current is composed and find that spin drift and spin diffusion contribute additively to the spin current, where the spin diffusion current decreases with electric field while the spin drift current increases, demonstrating that the extension of the spin diffusion length by a strong field does not result in a significant increase in spin current in semiconductors owing to the competing effect of the electric field on diffusion. We also find that there is a spin drift-diffusion crossover field for a process in which the drift and diffusion contribute equally to the spin current, which suggests a possible method of identifying whether the process for a given electric field is in the spin drift or spin diffusion regime. Spin drift-diffusion crossover fields for GaAs are calculated and are found to be quite small. We derive the relations between intrinsic spin diffusion length and the spin drift-diffusion crossover field of a semiconductor for different electron statistical regimes. The findings resulting from this investigation might be important for semiconductor spintronics.     

Manipulating spin current in the magnetic nanopillar

Because of the capability to switch the magnetization of a nanoscale magnet, the spin transfer effect is critical for the application of magnetic random access memory. For this purpose, it is important to enhance the spin current carried by the charge current. Calculations based on the diffusive spin-dependent transport equations reveal that the magnitude of spin current can be tuned by modifying the ferromagnetic layer and the spin relaxation process in the device. Increasing the ferromagnetic layer thickness is found to enhance both the spin current and the spin accumulation. On the other hand, a strong spin relaxation in the capping layer also increases the spin current but suppresses the spin accumulation. To demonstrate the theoretical results, nanopillar structures with the size of approximately 100 nm are fabricated and the current-induced magnetization switching behaviors are experimentally studied. When the ferromagnetic layer thickness is increased from 3 nm to 20 nm, the critical switching current for the current-induced magnetization switching is significantly reduced, indicating the enhancement of the spin current. When the Au capping layer with a short spin-diffusion length replaces the Cu capping layer with a long spin-diffusion length, the reduction of the critical switching current is also observed.     

Current-induced domain nucleation in ferromagnet

A key mechanism of the current-induced magnetization dynamics is the spin torque from a spin polarized current (spin current), which couples to spatial gradient of magnetization. Recently, it was pointed out that a large spin current applied to a uniform ferromagnet leads to a spin-wave instability. In this paper, we show that such instability is absent in a state containing a domain wall. This may indicate that nucleation of magnetic domains occurs above a certain critical spin current. This scenario is supported by an explicit energy comparison between the uniformly magnetized state and the domain-wall state under spin current.     

Giant enhancement of spin accumulation and long-distance spin precession in metallic lateral spin valves

The non-local spin injection in lateral spin valves is strongly expected to be an effective method to generate a pure spin current for potential spintronic application. However, the spin-valve voltage, which determines the magnitude of the spin current flowing into an additional ferromagnetic wire, is typically of the order of 1 μV. Here we show that lateral spin valves with low-resistivity NiFe/MgO/Ag junctions enable efficient spin injection with high applied current density, which leads to the spin-valve voltage increasing 100-fold. Hanle effect measurements demonstrate a long-distance collective 2π spin precession along a 6-μm-long Ag wire. These results suggest a route to faster and manipulable spin transport for the development of pure spin-current-based memory, logic and sensing devices.     

Giant spin Hall effect in perpendicularly spin-polarized FePt/Au devices

Conversion of charge current into pure spin current and vice versa in non-magnetic semiconductors or metals, which are called the direct and inverse spin Hall effects (SHEs), provide a new functionality of materials for future spin-electronic architectures. Thus, the realization of a large SHE in a device with a simple and practical geometry is a crucial issue for its applications. Here, we present a multi-terminal device with a Au Hall cross and an FePt perpendicular spin injector to detect giant direct and inverse SHEs at room temperature. Perpendicularly magnetized FePt injects or detects perpendicularly polarized spin current without magnetic field, enabling the unambiguous identification of SHEs. The unprecedentedly large spin Hall resistance of up to 2.9 mOmega is attributed to the large spin Hall angle in Au through the skew scattering mechanism and the highly efficient spin injection due to the well-matched spin resistances of the chosen materials.     

Direct Optical Detection of a Pure Spin Current in Semiconductor

We predict that a pure spin current in a semiconductor may induce Faraday birefringence even without magnetization. The theory is based on a derived effective interaction between the spin current and a polarized light beam, where the helicity of a photon is mapped to spin 1/2. The effective coupling between the polarized light beam and electron spin current can be realized in direct-gap semiconductors such as GaAs with inherent spin–orbit coupling in valence bands, but it involves neither the Rashba nor the Dresselhaus effect of samples. We estimate the amplitude of the Faraday rotation due to a pure spin current, and we present its incident-beam-angle dependence. We show that this Faraday birefringence can be directly measured.     

The spin diffusion in normal and superfluid Fermi liquids

Spin diffusion in paramagnetic spin systems is a dissipative process which acts so as to remove all spatial variation of the magnetization. In normal and superfluid Fermi liquids its physical origin lies in the nonconservation property of the macroscopic magnetization current associated with the thermal excitations, the Landau and Bogoliubov quasiparticles, respectively. In the hydrodynamic limit this dissipative process manifests itself in a constitutive relation connecting the decaying magnetization current with gradients in the magnetization density via a coefficient of spin diffusion. Exchange contributions to the quasiparticle interaction introduce, in addition, reactive processes, which can be associated with a rotation of the quasiparticle spin current about the direction of the spin polarization. This so-called spin current rotation—or Leggett-Rice effect—leads to nonhydrodynamic behavior of the spin diffusion whenever the exchange frequency becomes comparable to the inverse spin current relaxation time. In this article I would like to review our current understanding of diffusional spin transport, as influenced by nonhydrodynamic effects, in normal and superfluid Fermi systems.Dedicated to Ludwig Tewordt on the occasion of his 65th birthday.     

Direct demonstration of decoupling of spin and charge currents in nanostructures

The notion of decoupling of spin and charge currents is one of the basic principles underlying the rapidly expanding field of spintronics. However, no direct demonstration of the phenomenon exists. We report a novel measurement in which a nonequilibrium spin population is created by a pointlike injection of current from a ferromagnet across a tunnel barrier into a one-dimensional spin channel and detected differentially by a pair of ferromagnetic electrodes placed symmetrically about the injection point. We demonstrate that the spin current is strictly isotropic about the injection point and, therefore, completely decoupled from the unidirectional charge current.     

Field dependence of switching currents in an exchange biased spin valve

Current induced magnetic reversal due to spin transfer torque is a promising candidate in advanced information storage technology. It has been intensively studied. This work reports the field-dependence of switching-currents for current induced magnetization switching in a uncoupled nano-sized cobalt-based spin valve of exchange biased type. The dependency is investigated in hysteretic regime at room temperature, in comparison with that of a trilayer simple spin valve. In the simple spin valve, the switching currents behave to the positive and the negative applied magnetic field symmetrically. In the exchange biased type, in contrast, the switching currents respond to the negative field in a quite unusual and different manner than to the positive field. A negative magnetic field then can shift the switching-currents into either negative or positive current range, dependently on whether a parallel or an antiparallel state of the spin valve was produced by that field. This different character of switching currents in the negative field range can be explained by the effect of the exchange bias pinning field on the spin-polarizer (the fixed Co layer) of the exchange biased spin valve. That unidirectional pinning filed could suppress the thermal magnetization fluctuation in the spin-polarizer, leading to a higher spin polarization of the current, and hence a lower switching current density than in the simple spin valve.     

Detection of spin reversal and nutations through current measurements

The dynamics of a single spin embedded in a tunnel junction between ferromagnetic contacts is strongly affected by the exchange coupling to the tunneling electrons. Moment reversal of the local spin induced by the bias voltage across the junction is shown to have a measurable effect on the tunneling current. Furthermore, the frequency of a harmonic bias voltage is picked up by the local spin dynamics and transferred back to the current, generating a double frequency component.     

自旋注入对有机半导体极化子电导的影响

在有机半导体自旋电子器件中,自旋从铁磁极注入到有机半导体后,自旋相上的极化子和自旋向下的极化子有不同的态密度,从而产生不同的电导.利用自旋漂移一扩散方程通过自洽计算得到了铁磁/有机半导体自旋注入结构中极化子自旋相关的电导和电流的自旋极化率.计算结果表明,极化子电导的自旋相关性是自旋注入引起的,和电流的自旋极化率密切相关;在自旋注入发生后,有机半导体内不同位置上极化子自旋态密度不同,由此产生的极化子电导也不相同,极化予电导是位置的函数.另外还发现,外电场会增强有机半导体电流的自旋极化率.     

Investigations on the Magnetization Switching Dynamics in Spin Valve Multilayers Under Periodic Applied Magnetic Field

Magnetization switching dynamics in a spin valve nanopillar, induced by spin transfer torque in the presence of a periodic applied field is investigated by solving the Landau–Lifshitz–Gilbert–Slonczewski equation. Under steady state conditions, the switching of magnetization occurs in the system, above a threshold current density value J _c. A general expression for the critical current density is derived and it is shown that this further reduces when there is magnetic interface anisotropy present in the free layer of the spin valve. We also investigated the chaotic behavior of the free layer magnetization vector in a periodically varying applied magnetic field, in the presence of a constant DC magnetic field and spin current. Further, it is found that in the presence of a nonzero interfacial anisotropy, chaotic behavior is observed even at much smaller values of the spin current and DC applied field.     

Current Pumping from Spin Dynamics

We show theoretically that charge and spin currents arise from spin dynamics in the presence of the spin–orbit interaction. The dominant calculation is the inverse spin Hall effect, namely the spin current pumped from precession of local spins is converted into the charge current by the spin–orbit interaction. The conversion mechanism is explained based on the conservation laws of charge and spin.     

Observation of the intrinsic pinning of a magnetic domain wall in a ferromagnetic nanowire

The spin transfer torque is essential for electrical magnetization switching. When a magnetic domain wall is driven by an electric current through an adiabatic spin torque, the theory predicts a threshold current even for a perfect wire without any extrinsic pinning. The experimental confirmation of this 'intrinsic pinning', however, has long been missing. Here, we give evidence that this intrinsic pinning determines the threshold, and thus that the adiabatic spin torque dominates the domain wall motion in a perpendicularly magnetized Co/Ni nanowire. The intrinsic nature manifests itself both in the field-independent threshold current and in the presence of its minimum on tuning the wire width. The demonstrated domain wall motion purely due to the adiabatic spin torque will serve to achieve robust operation and low energy consumption in spintronic devices.     

Spin current,spin accumulation and spin Hall effect

Abstract

Nonlocal spin transport in nanostructured devices with ferromagnetic injector (F1) and detector (F2) electrodes connected to a normal conductor (N) is studied. We reveal how the spin transport depends on interface resistance, electrode resistance, spin polarization and spin diffusion length, and obtain the conditions for efficient spin injection, spin accumulation and spin current in the device. It is demonstrated that the spin Hall effect is caused by spin–orbit scattering in nonmagnetic conductors and gives rise to the conversion between spin and charge currents in a nonlocal device. A method of evaluating spin–orbit coupling in nonmagnetic metals is proposed.     

Spin transfer torques in the nonlocal lateral spin valve

We report a theoretical study on the spin and electron transport in the nonlocal lateral spin valve with a non-collinear magnetic configuration. The nonlocal magnetoresistance, defined as the voltage difference on the detection lead over the injected current, is derived analytically. The spin transfer torques on the detection lead are calculated. It is found that spin transfer torques are symmetrical for parallel and antiparallel magnetic configurations, in contrast to that in a conventional sandwiched spin valve.     

Spin transport in be edge-doped graphene nanoribbon

We report an atomistic simulation of spin dependent charge transport in zigzag graphene nanoribbons with 4 zigzag chains doped by a Beryllium atom on one edge. The spin dependent density functional theory with norm-conserving atomic basis set is employed to describe the system and the current versus voltage behavior is calculated by the nonequilibrium Green's function method for quantum transport. The Be impurity atom suppresses the local magnetization near the edge and the transmitted charge current becomes spin polarized accordingly. Both spin-up and spin-down transmission spectra are modified significantly but in different ways. Distinguished from the previous doping results of other impurity elements, here we observe negative differential resistance for only one of the spins in the nonlinear transport regime below bias 1.5 V. Molecular projected Hamiltonian energy spectrum near the impurity shows that the impurity removes the energy degeneracy of spin in perfect ribbon. The current versus voltage shows semiconductor behavior with fluctuating spin polarization of amplitude up to 37%.     

Spin gain transistor in ferromagnetic semiconductors-the semiconductor Bloch-equations approach

A scheme and principle of operation of a "spin gain transistor" are proposed. A large unmagnetized current creates the carrier density sufficient for the ferromagnetic transition; a small magnetized current initiates spontaneous magnetization. Large magnetized current is then extracted. Thus, spin gain of >1000 is predicted. Collective dynamics of spins under Coulomb exchange interaction is described via semiconductor Bloch equations.