Abstract
To realize room-temperature ferromagnetic semiconductors is still a challenge in spintronics. Recent experiments have obtained two-dimensional (2D) room-temperature ferromagnetic metals, such as monolayer . In this paper, we proposed a way to obtain room-temperature ferromagnetic semiconductors through metal-semiconductor transition. By the density-functional theory calculations, a room-temperature ferromagnetic semiconductor is obtained in monolayer with a few-percent tensile strain, where a metal-semiconductor transition occurs with 2.2% tensile strain. The tensile strains raise the energy of orbitals of Mn atoms and orbitals of Se atoms near the Fermi level, making the Fermi-level sets in the energy gap of bonding and antibonding states of these and orbitals, and opening a small band gap. The room-temperature ferromagnetic semiconductors are also obtained in the heterostructures /X (X = , GaSe, SiH, and GaP), where metal-semiconductor transition happens due to the tensile strains by interface of heterostructures. In addition, a large magneto-optical Kerr effect (MOKE) is obtained in monolayer with tensile strain and -based heterostructures. Our theoretical results pave a way to obtain room-temperature magnetic semiconductors from experimentally obtained 2D room-temperature ferromagnetic metals through metal-semiconductor transitions.
- Received 25 December 2023
- Revised 3 March 2024
- Accepted 8 April 2024
DOI:https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.109.134436
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