Dynamical Nuclear Polarization by Electrical Spin Injection in Ferromagnet-Semiconductor Heterostructures

Abstract

Electrical spin injection from Fe into Al$_x$Ga$_{1-x}$As quantum well heterostructures is demonstrated in small (< 500 Oe) in-plane magnetic fields. The measurement is sensitive only to the component of the spin that precesses about the internal magnetic field in the semiconductor. This field is much larger than the applied field and depends strongly on the injection current density. Details of the observed hysteresis in the spin injection signal are reproduced in a model that incorporates the magnetocrystalline anisotropy of the epitaxial Fe film, spin relaxation in the semiconductor, and the dynamical polarization of nuclei by the injected spins.