ABSTRACT
The word “spintronics” is made from two words, spin and electronics and refers to the emerging field of spin-polarized transport in solids. It is based on the control and manipulation of an electron’s spin leading to novel spintronic devices such as spin-field transistors, spin storage/memory devices, or spin quantum computers. Since the electron’s spin can be switched from one state to another much faster than charge can move around a circuit, spintronic devices are expected to operate much faster. Furthermore, such devices are expected to produce less heat than conventional electronic devices. Also spintronic devices are expected to be of much smaller size compared to conventional microelectronic devices leading to further miniaturization.
