Edge Tailored MgO Nanoribbons for Spintronics Applications: A First Principle Investigations

Abstract

In the present theoretical investigations, we have reported the potential of magnesium oxide nanoribbons (MgONRs) for spintronic applications by deploying density functional theory (DFT) in correlation with nonequilibrium Green’s function (NEGF). All the considered MgONRs are thermodynamically stable according to binding energy ( $\textit{E}_\textit{b}$ ) results. Pristine MgONR (HH-MgO-HH) is ferromagnetic (FM) metal while the selective edge hydrogenated MgONRs with one edge partially bare (HH-MgO-HB) and one edge partially hydrogenated (HB-MgO-BB) are half-metals in FM and anti-FM (AFM) ground states (GSs), respectively. Furthermore, the HH-MgO-HB and HB-MgO-BB are investigated for their transport characteristics. Current magnitude in HH-MgO-HB is negligibly small and hence HB-MgO-BB is further investigated for spintronic applications. Spin-based rectification characteristics are reported in AP spin orientation with a rectification ratio (RR) of the order of 10 $^\text{6}$ for spin-up currents. A very high spin filtering efficiency (SFE) is noticed in HB-MgO-BB with near 100% efficiency. Moreover, giant magnetoresistance (GMR) is noticed in HB-MgO-BB with computed value of 5.52 $\times$ 10 $^{\text{11}}$ and 1.00 $\times$ 10 $^{\text{10}}$ for spin-down and spin-up currents, respectively. Obtained findings suggest the MgONRs are promising candidates for future spintronics technology.