Ultrafast and gigantic spin injection in semiconductors

Abstract

The injection of spin currents in semiconductors is one of the big challenges of spintronics. Motivated by the ultrafast demagnetisation and spin injection into metals, we propose an alternative femtosecond route based on the laser excitation of superdiffusive spin currents in a ferromagnet such as Ni. Our calculations show that even though only a fraction of the current crosses the Ni-Si interface, the laser-induced creation of strong transient electrical fields at a ferromagnet-semiconductor interface allows for the injection of chargeless spin currents with a record spin polarisations of 80%. Beyond that they are pulsed on the time scale of 100 femtoseconds which opens the door for new experiments and ultrafast spintronics.