Electrical spin injection and detection in molybdenum disulfide multilayer channel

• Published in: Nature communications Vol. 8; no. 1; p. 14947
• Main Authors: Liang, Shiheng, Yang, Huaiwen, Renucci, Pierre, Tao, Bingshan, Laczkowski, Piotr, Mc-Murtry, Stefan, Wang, Gang, Marie, Xavier, George, Jean-Marie, Petit-Watelot, Sébastien, Djeffal, Abdelhak, Mangin, Stéphane, Jaffrès, Henri, Lu, Yuan
• Format: Journal Article
• Language: English
• Published: London Nature Publishing Group UK 07-04-2017; Nature Publishing Group; Nature Portfolio
• Subjects: 142/126; 639/301/119/1001; 639/301/357/1018; Condensed Matter; Electrodes; Electrons; Humanities and Social Sciences; Molybdenum; multidisciplinary; Other; Physics; Plasma etching; Science; Science (multidisciplinary); Symmetry; France
• ISSN: 2041-1723; 2041-1723
• DOI: 10.1038/ncomms14947

Molybdenum disulfide has recently emerged as a promising two-dimensional semiconducting material for nano-electronic, opto-electronic and spintronic applications. However, the demonstration of an electron spin transport through a semiconducting MoS
2
channel remains challenging. Here we show the evidence of the electrical spin injection and detection in the conduction band of a multilayer MoS
2
semiconducting channel using a two-terminal spin-valve configuration geometry. A magnetoresistance around 1% has been observed through a 450 nm long, 6 monolayer thick MoS
2
channel with a Co/MgO tunnelling spin injector and detector. It is found that keeping a good balance between the interface resistance and channel resistance is mandatory for the observation of the two-terminal magnetoresistance. Moreover, the electron spin-relaxation is found to be greatly suppressed in the multilayer MoS
2
channel with an in-plane spin polarization. The long spin diffusion length (approximately ∼235 nm) could open a new avenue for spintronic applications using multilayer transition metal dichalcogenides.
MoS
2
is a promising two-dimensional candidate for opto-electronic and spintronic applications. Here, the authors report electrical spin injection and detection in a few-layered MoS
2
channel, demonstrating that the spin diffusion length is at least 235 nm in MoS
2
conduction band.