Development of transition-metal doped copper oxide and zinc oxide dilute magnetic semiconductors

The field of spintronics has recently attracted much attention because of its potential to provide new functionalities and enhanced performance in conventional electronic devices. Oxide materials provide a convenient platform to study the spin-based functionality in host semiconducting material. Recent theoretical treatments predict that wide band-gap semiconductors, including ZnO, can exhibit high temperature ferromagnetic ordering when doped with transition metals. This work focused on the possibility of using wide band-gap oxide semiconductors as potential spintronic materials. The structure, magnetic, and electronic transport properties of transition-metal doped ZnO and Cu 2O were investigated. Mn and Co were used as transition metal dopants. Thin films of these materials were fabricated using pulsed laser deposition (PLD).; The Mn solubility in Cu2O was found to be small and the precipitation of Mn-oxides was favored at high growth temperatures. Phase pure Mn-doped Cu2O samples were found to be non-magnetic. Samples were p-type with carrier concentrations on the order of 1014-10 16 cm-3.; The effects of carrier concentration on the magnetic properties of Mn-doped ZnO were studied using Sn and P as electronic codopants. Sn acts as an n-type dopant providing extra electrons to the ZnO. P acts as a p-type dopant that supplies excess holes to compensate the native electron concentration in ZnO. The electron concentration was decreased using P, but the films remained n-type. An inverse correlation was found between the ferromagnetism and the electron concentration; the ferromagnetic coupling between Mn spins increased with decreasing electron concentration.; The nature of ferromagnetism in Co-doped ZnO was also investigated. Ferromagnetism was found in films deposited at 400°C in vacuum, while films deposited in oxygen or at higher temperatures were non-magnetic. Films deposited under vacuum had rather high electron concentrations and were presumably doped with oxygen vacancies. The Co-doped films also exhibited peculiar magnetoresistance (MR) that had a strong dependence on the carrier concentration. At low temperatures, a progression from positive to negative MR was observed with increased electron concentration as the films crossed over the metal-to-insulator transition (MIT).