Giant magnetoresistance in Fe/SiO2/p-Si hybrid structure under non-equilibrium conditions

The giant magnetoresistive (MR) effect was investigated in a simple Fe/SiO2/p-Si-hybrid-structure-based device from two back-to-back Schottky diodes. The effect was revealed only under the non-equilibrium conditions caused by optical radiation. It is demonstrated that the magnetoresistance ratio attains 100 or more. The main peculiarity of the MR behavior is its strong dependence on the magnitude and the sign of the bias current across the device and, most surprisingly, upon polarity of the magnetic field. It is important that the magnetoresistive effect is implemented exclusively in the subsystem of minority charge carriers transferred to the non-equilibrium states. The development of magneto-sensitive devices of this type can give grounds for a novel direction of semiconductor spintronics.