Suppression of in-plane tunneling anisotropic magnetoresistance effect in Co2MnSi/MgO/n-GaAs and CoFe/MgO/n-GaAs junctions by inserting a MgO barrier

The effects of MgO tunnel barriers on both junction resistance and tunneling anisotropic magnetoresistance (TAMR) characteristics of Co2MnSi(CMS)/MgO/n-GaAs junctions and Co50Fe50(CoFe)/MgO/n-GaAs junctions were investigated. The resistance-area (RA) product of the CMS/MgO/n-GaAs junctions showed an exponential dependence on MgO thickness (t(MgO)), indicating that the MgO layer acts as a tunneling barrier. The RA product of CMS/MgO/n-GaAs with t(MgO)< 1 nm was smaller than that of the sample without MgO. The observed spin-valvelike magnetoresistance of CMS/n-GaAs and CoFe/n-GaAs Schottky tunnel junctions attributed to the TAMR effect did not appear in the cases of CMS/MgO/n-GaAs and CoFe/MgO/n-GaAs tunnel junctions. The lowering of the RA product and the suppression of the TAMR effect caused by inserting a thin MgO layer between CMS and n-GaAs were both possibly due to suppression of the Fermi-level pinning of GaAs and lowering of the Schottky barrier height. (c) 2011 American Institute of Physics. [doi:10.1063/1.3595311]