AVS 50th International Symposium
    Magnetic Interfaces and Nanostructures Friday Sessions
       Session MI+SC-FrM

Paper MI+SC-FrM11
Chemical Intermixing and Spin Injection in Fe/AlGaAs Schottky Barrier SpinLEDs

Friday, November 7, 2003, 11:40 am, Room 316

Session: Semiconductor Spin Injection
Presenter: R.M. Stroud, Naval Research Laboratory
Authors: R.M. Stroud, Naval Research Laboratory
A.T. Hanbicki, Naval Research Laboratory
G. Kioseoglou, Naval Research Laboratory
O.M.J. van Erve, Naval Research Laboratory
C.H. Li, Naval Research Laboratory
B.T. Jonker, Naval Research Laboratory
G. Itskos, SUNY Buffalo
R. Mallory, SUNY Buffalo
M. Yasar, SUNY Buffalo
A. Petrou, SUNY Buffalo
Correspondent: Click to Email
Injected spin polarizations ranging from 13% to 32% have been measured for Fe/AlGaAs Schottky barrier spin-polarized light emitting diodes spinLEDs.@footnote 1@ Transmission electron microscopy studies of these devices show evidence for diffusion of the Fe into the underlying AlGaAs. High-resolution images indicate an expansion of the AlGaAs (100) plane spacing near the interface by up to 15% and a change in contrast. The Fe diffusion is confirmed by energy-dispersive x-ray spectroscopy and Z-contrast imaging. The thickness of the intermixing region estimated from lattice images inversely correlates with the injected spin polarization, ranging from 0.8 nm +/- 0.3 nm for the 32% spin polarization sample up to 1.6 nm +/- 0.3 nm for the 13% spin polarization sample. Spin scattering in this intermixing region may explain the reduction in the injected spin polarization. This work was supported by ONR and the DARPA SpinS program. @FootnoteText@ @footnote 1@Hanbicki, et al., APL 80 (7): 1240-1242 (2002).