Two Ohio State physicists have created the first electronic circuit to merge traditional inorganic semiconductors with organic “spintronics” – devices that utilize the spin of electrons to read, write and manipulate data. Ezekiel Johnston-Halperin, assistant professor of physics, (pictured left) and his team combined an inorganic semiconductor with a unique plastic material that is under development in colleague Arthur J. Epstein’s lab.

Last year, Epstein, Distinguished University Professor of physics and chemistry and director of the Institute for Magnetic and Electronic Polymers at Ohio State, demonstrated the first successful data storage and retrieval on a plastic spintronic device.

Now Johnston-Halperin, Epstein, and their colleagues have incorporated the plastic device into a traditional circuit based on gallium arsenide. Two of their now-former doctoral students, Lei Fang and Deniz Bozdag, had to devise a new fabrication technique to make the device.

In a recent paper published online in the journal Physical Review Letters, they describe how they transmitted a spin-polarized electrical current from the plastic material, through the gallium arsenide, and into a light-emitting diode (LED) as proof that the organic and inorganic parts were working together.

Read the University Research Communications press release written by Pam Frost Gorder at: http://researchnews.osu.edu/archive/hybridspin.htm

http://researchnew.osu.edu/archive/hybridspin/htm