Nitrogen-vacancy induced intrinsic ferromagnetism and half-metallicity in BN

•Nitrogen vacancies can promote the formation of local magnetic moments.•The magnetic coupling between these intrinsic defects induced moments is long-ranged.•A neutral N vacancy brings a spin polarized state with a magnetic moment of 1μB.•The magnetic moment mainly comes from the spin polarized B atoms around the N vacancies.•The defective BN system containing N vacancies shows a half-metallic character.

Using the first-principles method based on density functional theory, we investigated the electronic structure, magnetic properties and the formation energy of N vacancies-doped in BN. The results indicate that nitrogen vacancies can promote the formation of local magnetic moments and the magnetic coupling between these intrinsic defects induced moments is long-ranged. A neutral N vacancy brings a spin polarized state with a magnetic moment of 1μB, and the magnetic moment mainly comes from the spin polarized B atoms around the N vacancies. In addition, it also was found that the defective BN system containing N vacancies shows a half-metallic character.