PrefaceSince the first theoretical prediction of a half-metallic material -one in which the electrons of one spin participate in conduction while those of the other do not -was published in 1983, much effort has been exerted to understand, predict, and grow new half-metallic materials. A main impetus for this effort has been the great potential for half-metals (HMs) in spintronics -a new generation of electronics in which the electron spin, as well as its charge, is exploited to achieve substantial reductions in size and/or improvements in performance. In an HM, the electrons of one spin channel are metallic while those of the other are insulating, the spin polarization at Fermi level is complete (100%), and the magnetic moment is an integer. Partially spin-polarized spintronic materials, such as Co/Fe layered structures, have already led to breakthroughs in information storage and processing technologies, such as magnetoresistance (MR)-based read heads, magnetic random access memory (MRAM), and spin-current switches. Because HMs exhibit very large (ideally, infinite) MRs, it is not surprising that the design and realization of HM devices have been among the hottest topics in condensed matter physics and materials science in recent years.Tremendous theoretical, experimental, and technological progress in the understanding of half-metallic materials has been achieved in the past few years, and the scientific literature has grown correspondingly. It is opportune, therefore, to summarize the main concepts, results, and advances in order to spark and facilitate new research and provide a solid and coherent foundation for new researchers in this exciting field. These are the goals we set out to achieve in the present monograph, at a level appropriate for advanced undergraduate or graduate students in physics, chemistry, and materials science.In the introductory chapter, we give an overview of the main features, similarities, and differences among the three main classes of HMs which have emerged to date. We discuss key features from both a theoretical Half-metallic Materials and Their Propertiesand technological point of view. We emphasize the three basic interactions underlying half-metallic properties in all such materials in the hope that new half-metallic materials may be realized by tuning each of the interactions independently. For device applications, it is necessary to understand both electronic and magnetic properties. Substantial progress has been achieved both experimentally and theoretically in the endeavor to understand and predict the properties of half-metallic materials. In Chapter 2, we provide a discussion of the key experimental and theoretical techniques, as appropriate for each class of material, which have been employed to date in order to achieve that understanding and predictive capability. The three main classes of half-metallic materials that have emerged to date are: (i) the Heusler alloys; (ii) transition-metal oxides; and (iii) pnictides, chalcogenides, and carbides with the zincblende (...
Primitive Cell A substance is considered to be in a crystalline state (known as a crystal) if its constituent atoms are arranged in a regular and repetitive pattern. Crystals can be described by an object that, when repeated, generates the entire crystal. Such an object can be considered as a "building block" called a unit cell. The unit cell is spanned by three independent vectors a 1 , a 2 , and a 3 , which may or may not lie along the Cartesian coordinate axes. It contains only one lattice point, and its volume is
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