Electric field control of spin precession in a spin-injected Field Effect Transistor

Two decades ago, Datta and Das [1] predicted that the source-drain conductance of a spin-injected Field Effect Transistor (spin FET) would oscillate periodically with monotonically increasing gate voltage as a consequence of the Rashba spin-orbit interaction in the channel. The effect relies on ballistic transport and a relativistic transformation, and is unique because an electric field modulates the orientation of a magnetic moment. We have observed Datta-Das oscillations in a spin FET at cryogenic temperatures [2].