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A window on the future of spintronics

Nature Materials volume 9, pages 952–954 (2010)Cite this article

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Despite low transition temperatures, ferromagnetism in diluted magnetic semiconductors has been essential in exploring new ideas and concepts in spintronics, some of which have been successfully transferred to metallic ferromagnets.

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Figure 1: Electric control of ferromagnetic phase in ferromagnetic semiconductors.
Figure 2: With electric fields, the carrier concentration can be tuned to populate carriers differently among the spin–orbit states, resulting in a change in the magnetic anisotropy, which in turn changes the direction of magnetization M indicated by an angle φ (left panel).
Figure 3: Magnetic domain-wall creep is a motion of the domain wall induced by spin-polarized current or by magnetic field through a disordered potential landscape.

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Acknowledgements

I thank Fumihiro Matsukura, Michihiko Yamanouchi and Tomasz Dietl for discussions.

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  1. Hideo Ohno is at the Center for Spintronics Integrated Systems and the Laboratory for Nanoelectronics and Spintronics, Research Institute of Electrical Communication, Tohoku University, 2-1-1, Katahira, Aoba-ku, Sendai 980-8577, Japan. ohno@riec.tohoku.ac.jp,

    Hideo Ohno

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Ohno, H. A window on the future of spintronics. Nature Mater 9, 952–954 (2010). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat2913

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