May 2011

Researchers demonstrated high temperature electrical injection, detection and precession of spin accumulation in silicon

Researchers in the Materials Science and Technology division of the Naval Research Laboratory (NRL) demonstrated electrical injection, detection and precession of spin accumulation in silicon at temperatures up to 225 degrees Celsius. This is the first time that silicon spin accumulation is shown to be viable as a basis for practical spintronics devices that meet operating temperatures requirements (the highest is 125?C for military applications).

The NRL team used ferromagnetic metal / silicon dioxide contacts on silicon to electrically generate and detect spin accumulation and precession in the silicon transport channel. They concluded that the spin information can be transported in the silicon over distances readily compatible with existing fabrication technology.

Read the full story Posted: May 06,2011

UCSB gets $7.5 million to study quantum effects in diamonds

The University of Santa Barbara (UCSB) received $14.5 million from the U.S. Department of Defense (specifically from the Air Force Office of Scientific Research) investigate nano-scale computer chips and quantum computing. $7 million will go to UCSB’s Center for Spintronics and Quantum Computation. This center is led by David Awschalom. Here's David with a great introduction to Spintronics and Diamonds:

Read the full story Posted: May 03,2011