Europium chalcogenide magnetic semiconductor nanostructures

The ferromagnetic europium chalcogenides, have attracted wide interest due to the large saturation magnetization, the strong magneto-optic effect (Kerr or Faraday rotation), magnetoresistance, and spin filtering effects observed in EuO and EuS. These effects arise from the unusual coupling of electronic, magnetic and optical properties in these materials. We describe the synthetic strategies developed to prepare nanostructured europium sulfide and our investigations of the magnetic properties as a function of size and composition. In the first sections of this review we outline the approach to designing molecular precursors and nanoparticle synthesis (conditions to control size and shape). This is followed by a description of the magnetic experiments and analysis, as well as a discussion of the size dependent magnetic properties. Finally, we include a section on doping, another method to probe magnetic communication in europium chalcogenides.