Editor's Summary

16 November 2006

Go halves on metals

The existence of curious materials called 'half metals' is predicted: they are metallic only for half of the available free electrons, namely those in a particular spin orientation. For the other half of electrons, with the opposite spin, a half-metal is insulating. There is some experimental evidence for half-metallic behaviour, and substantial efforts are being made to find such materials that could be of practical use in spintronics. Based on first-principles calculations, Son et al. predict half-metallic behaviour in nanometre-scale ribbons of graphene. The property emerges when homogeneous electric fields are applied across the nanoribbons, with the zigzag-shaped edges attached to the voltage contacts. This work could be a step towards graphene-based nanospintronics.

Letter: Half-metallic graphene nanoribbons

Young-Woo Son, Marvin L. Cohen and Steven G. Louie

doi:10.1038/nature05180

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