Electric Field Modulation of Spin Accumulation in Nb-doped SrTiO3 with Ni/AlOx Spin Injection Contacts

We demonstrate an electric field control of spin lifetime at room temperature, across a semiconducting interface of Nb:STO using Ni/AlOx as spin injection contacts. We achieve this by a careful tailoring of the potential landscape in Nb:STO, driven by the strong response of the intrinsically large dielectric permittivity in STO to electric fields. The built-in electric field at the Schottky interface with Nb: STO tunes the intrinsic Rashba spin-orbit fields leading to a bias dependence of the spin lifetime in Nb:STO. Such an electric field driven modulation of spin accumulation has not been reported earlier using conventional semiconductors. This not only underpins the necessity of a careful design of the spin injection contacts but also establishes the importance of Nb:STO as a rich platform for exploring spin-orbit driven phenomena in complex oxide based spintronic devices.