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A spin of their own

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Although it is tempting to compare organic semiconductors with their inorganic counterparts, the spin-injection and spin-transport properties are fundamentally different. The challenges in understanding and improving such properties make organic spintronics an exciting field in its own right.

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Figure 1: Comparison between the electronic structures of typical inorganic and organic semiconductors, as calculated by density functional theory and the local density approximation.
Figure 2: Electrical characterization of an organic two-terminal diode: Al/Alq3(300)/Ca.
Figure 3: Schematic representation of the interface between a metal and an organic layer.
Figure 4: Spin-diffusion length lS versus spin-diffusion time τs, for various materials.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Greg Szulczewski, Stefano Sanvito and Michael Coey are at the School of Physics and CRANN, Trinity College Dublin, Ireland. sanvitos@tcd.ie; jcoey@tcd.ie,

    Greg Szulczewski, Stefano Sanvito & Michael Coey

  2. jcoey@tcd.ie,

    Greg Szulczewski, Stefano Sanvito & Michael Coey

  3. Department of Chemistry, Permanent address, University of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, USA. gjs@bama.ua.edu,

    Greg Szulczewski

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  1. Greg Szulczewski
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Szulczewski, G., Sanvito, S. & Coey, M. A spin of their own. Nature Mater 8, 693–695 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/nmat2518

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