Spin-dependent transport properties of a GaMnAs-based vertical spin metal-oxide- semiconductor field-effect transistor structure

TL;DR

This study demonstrates a vertical GaMnAs-based spin-MOSFET with significant magnetoresistance and current modulation, highlighting its potential for nanoscale spintronic devices.

Contribution

The paper reports the fabrication and characterization of a vertical spin-MOSFET using GaMnAs, showing enhanced magnetoresistance and current modulation capabilities.

Findings

Drain-source current modulated by gate voltage and magnetization configuration.

Magnetoresistance ratio exceeds previous spin MOSFETs by over two orders of magnitude.

Vertical structure promising for nanoscale spintronic applications.

Abstract

We fabricate a vertical spin metal-oxide-semiconductor field-effect transistor (spin-MOSFET) structure, which is composed of an epitaxial single-crystal heterostructure with a ferromagnetic-semiconductor GaMnAs source/drain, and investigate its spin-dependent transport properties. We modulate the drain-source current IDS by ~+ or -0.5 % with a gate-source voltage of + or -10.8 V and also modulate IDS by up to 60 % with changing the magnetization configuration of the GaMnAs source/drain at 3.5 K. The magnetoresistance ratio is more than two orders of magnitude higher than that obtained in the previous studies on spin MOSFETs. Our result shows that a vertical structure is one of the hopeful candidates for spin MOSFET when the device size is reduced to a sub-micron or nanometer scale.