Graphene Based Spin Valve Devices

Graphene is a name given to an atomic layer of carbon atoms densely packed into a benzene-ring structure with a nearest-neighbour distance of ~1.4Aring. This theoretical material is widely used in the description of the crystal structure and properties of graphite, large fullerenes and carbon nanotubes. As a first approximation, graphite is made of graphene layers relatively loosely stacked on top of each other with a fairly large interlayer distance of ~3.4Aring . Carbon nanotubes are usually thought of as graphene layers rolled into hollow cylinders. Graphene films are made by repeated peeling of small (mm-sized) mesas of highly-oriented pyrolytic graphite (HOPG). The exfoliation continues until flakes that are nearly invisible in an optical microscope are obtained. A simple spin valve structure has been fabricated from such films using electron beam lithography. This is based on a symmetrical electrode structure and relies on imperfections in the two ferromagnetic electrodes to give different switching fields for each electrode. Despite this highly non-optimised structure we observed a 10% change in resistance at 300 K as the applied field is swept between +450 G and -450 G. The 10% change in resistance is much larger than can be attributed to MR effects in the individual permalloy electrodes (2.5% maximum), giving confidence that it is due to the spin valve effect with the graphene acting as the non-magnetic conductor. Although spin valve effects have been observed in carbon nanotubes this is the first observation of this effect in planar graphene.