Electrical switching effect of a single-unit-cell CrO2 layer on rutile TiO2 surface

Abstract

Rutile CrO2 is the most important half-metallic material with nearly 100% spin polarization at the Fermi level, and rutile TiO2 is a wide-gap semiconductor with many applications. Here we show through first-principles investigation that a single-unit-cell CrO2 layer on rutile TiO2 (001) surface is ferromagnetic and semiconductive with a gap of 0.54 eV, and its electronic state transits abruptly to a typical metallic state when an electrical field is applied. Consequently, this makes an interesting electrical switching effect which may be useful in designing spintronic devices.