Electrical bistability and spin valve effect in a ferromagnet/organic semiconductor/ferromagnet heterojunction

Abstract

We report a study of the electrical bistability and bias-controlled spin valve effect in an organic device using rubrene (C(42)H(28)) as an organic semiconductor channel. The half-metallic La(0.7)Sr(0.3)MnO(3) (LSMO) and Fe are used as the two ferromagnetic electrodes. The device displays reproducible switching between a low-impedance (ON) state and a high-impedance (OFF) state by applying different polarities of high biases. In the ON state, the device shows a spin valve effect with magnetoresistance values up to 3.75%. The observed spin valve effect disappears when the device recovers to the initial OFF state. (C) 2010 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.