Giant spin accumulation in silicon nonlocal spin-transport devices

Abstract

Although the electrical injection, transport and detection of spins in silicon have been achieved, the induced spin accumulation was much smaller than expected and desired, limiting the potential impact of Si-based spintronic devices. Here, using non-local spin-transport devices with an n-type Si channel and Fe/MgO magnetic tunnel contacts, we demonstrate that it is possible to create a giant spin accumulation in Si, with the spin splitting reaching 13 meV at 10 K and 3.5 meV at room temperature. The non-local spin signals are in good agreement with a numerical evaluation of spin injection and diffusion that explicitly takes the size of the injector contact into account. The giant spin accumulation originates from the large tunnel spin polarization of the Fe/MgO contacts (53 % at 10 K and 18 % at 300 K), and the spin density enhancement achieved by using a spin injector with a size comparable to the spin-diffusion length of the Si. The ability to induce a giant spin accumulation enables the development of Si spintronic devices with a large magnetic response.

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• Investigation of gating effect in Si spin MOSFET
• Effects of screened Coulomb interaction on spin transfer torque
• Gate-tunable spin exclusive or operation in a silicon-based spin device at room temperature
• High temperature spin selectivity in a quantum dot qubit using reservoir spin accumulation
• On the origin of the giant spin detection efficiency in tunnel barrier based electrical spin detector
• Large spin signal and spin rectification in folded-bilayer graphene
• A roadmap for the design of four-terminal spin valves and the extraction of spin diffusion length
• Spin-orbit torque on nuclear spins exerted by a spin accumulation via hyperfine interactions
• Optical spin pumping in silicon