Lateral spin injection and detection through electrodeposited Fe/GaAs interfaces

We report results on spin injection and detection through epitaxial, electrodeposited Fe/GaAs tunnel barriers formed ex-situ on epitaxially grown GaAs (001). The BCC-Fe ?lms are predominantly single crystalline with large mosaic spread [1]. Tunnel junctions, fabricated with bulk GaAs wafers, and epitaxially grown MBE or MOCVD GaAs (001), showed the expected increase in tunneling current with increasing surface Si dopant concentration. Spin transport through in situ coherently strain, MBE Fe/GaAs interfaces have been reported at spin polarization levels as high as 42{\%} at 50K.[3]. In our experiments the design of the epitaxially grown GaAs substrates followed those used successfully for in situ MBE Fe spin contacts. [2]. A spin voltage (4 mV) has been detected for 2x10$^{18}$/cm3 doped tunnel junctions at liquid nitrogen temperatures (77 K) using an injection current of 20 A/cm2 while varying the applied in-plane magnetic ?eld ($\pm $ 300 Gauss) along a $<$100$>$ easyaxis of the Fe contacts. 1. Z. L. Bao, S. Majumder, A. A. Talin, A. S. Arrott, K. L. Kavanagh, JES 155 (2008) H841. 2. X. Lou, C. Adelmann, A. S. Crooker, E. S. Garlidi, J. Zhang, K. S. Reddy, S. D. Flexner, C. J. Palmstr{\o}m, and P.A. Crowell, Nature Phys. 3 (2007) 197.