Electronic structure and half-metallic property of Mn-doped β-SiC diluted magnetic semiconductor

✍ Scribed by Yoon-Suk Kim; Yong-Chae Chung; Sung-Chul Yi

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 2006
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 178 KB
• Volume: 126
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0921-5107
• DOI: 10.1016/j.mseb.2005.09.022

✦ Synopsis

Using ab initio ultrasoft pseudopotential plane wave method, the effect of doping concentration of Mn on the magnetic properties of ␤-SiC (SiC:Mn) was quantitatively investigated. It is found that the SiC:Mn shows stable ferromagnetism, and the total magnetic moment of SiC:Mn depends on the substitution site of Mn in the SiC lattice. Using the density of states calculation, it is shown that SiC:Mn has half-metallic properties for selected doping concentrations of 1.56, 3.13 and 6.25%, irrespective of substitution site. The conduction electron mobility of SiC:Mn C was expected to be higher than that of SiC:Mn Si . On the contrary, SiC:Mn Si has a wider spin band gap compared to SiC:Mn C . It is predicted that SiC with 12.5% Mn doping represents desirable characteristics for realizing spintronic devices, which include stable ferromagnetism, half-metallic properties, fast electron mobility and a wide spin band gap.