Abstract
The past few decades have witnessed a significant development in a new kind of compounds: diluted magnetic semiconductor (DMS) which paves the way to the development of a novel research field dubbed “spintronics”. The main challenge of contemporary DMSs is to raise the Curie temperature at, or even above, room temperature so as to be integrated with microelectronic and optoelectronic devices. Until now, many efforts have been devoted into developments of DMS-based spintronic applications. For example, Ohno et al. modulated the Curie temperature in (In, Mn)As in a metal-insulator-semiconductor device by applying an external electric field, which was one of the earliest reports of electrical manipulation of magnetism.Since there is a strong correlation between the electrical, optical and magnetic properties of a material, DMS also plays a vital role in exploring new effects and applications that has not been raised attentions. For instance, in conductive Mn-substituted ZnO films, the band gap of ZnO can be tuned by controlling different concentrations of Mn dopants at room temperature. This result points to be the possibility of manipulation of optical properties in semiconductors by control of magnetic moment. Thus, more detailed and probing investigations are needed for future technology in DMS arena.
In this thesis, we focused on the study of the effect of magnetic order on the optical and electrical properties in the DMSs. Two materials are chosen as the candidates in our work: one is Mn doped zinc oxide and the other is Fe doped indium tin oxide.
| Date of Award | 31 Aug 2016 |
|---|---|
| Original language | English |
| Awarding Institution |
|
| Supervisor | Antonio RUOTOLO (Supervisor) |