Electron interaction and spin accumulation in spin polarized tunneling

Publisher Website
Google Scholar
Abstract
We discuss the effect of electron interaction and spin accumulation on spin polarized tunneling. Charges of opposite magnitude are induced on opposite sides of the insulator. There is a splitting between the spin up and spin down bands which produces an additional contribution to the magnetoresistance. The ratio between the splitting and the current is an effective resistance, Rs. The difference between Rs on opposite sides of the junction is of the order of (much less than) the interfacial resistance when the magnetization of the ferromagnets are parallel (antiparallel) to each other. The signal to background ratio for the change in Rs between the parallel and the antiparallel configuration is much bigger than that for the resistance. This Rs (kΩ) is much larger in magnitude than that (≊10−5 Ω) observed in metallic trilayers and thus maybe of practical interest for applications.