Researchers from Australia's La Trobe University find that when diamonds are treated in hydrogen plasma they incorporate the hydrogen atoms into the surface, and when exposed to moist air, they become electrically conductive. The researchers measured how strongly a charge carrier's spin interacts with a magnetic field in this diamond-based material and found the material to be promising for spintronic devices.
The diamond material features strong spin-orbit coupling, which enables one to control the particle's spin with an electric field. Following previous researchers, it is now found that these material features several interesting properties that could enable manipulation of spins in the conductive surface layer of diamond by either electric or magnetic fields.