Mark Hickey graduated from Univeristy College Cork with adegree in Physics and Applied Mathematics in 2002. He then went onto get a PhD in physics at the University of Cambridge in 2005, inthe group of Prof. Sir Michael Pepper. Having worked as researchfellow in the University of Leeds, he is now a Fulbright Scholar atMIT in the U.S.

The injection of spin polarised electrons into semiconductors is a fundamentalchallenge in the emergent field of spin electronics. This work isan investigation into spin injection from magnetic thin film contactsinto (100) GaAs/InGaAs quantum wells in spin light emitting diodes(spin LEDs). This structure is relevant to many quantum dot devicelayers. The spin injection characteristics are examined as a function of photon energy, magnetic field, applied bias, externaloptical efficiency and temperature.Further, the Heusler alloys Co2TiSn and Co2CrAl are investigatedthrough ab initio electronic structure calculations as potentially highlypolarised spin injectors. Pronounced minority spin band gaps were found in these alloysand while majority spins are metallic, minority spins undergo hole-likedispersion near the Fermi level.While spin injection is observed from both Heusler alloy and Fe injectors, Fe is a moreefficient spin injector and gives room temperature results. The biasdependent spin injection shows a decrease at higher voltages due tohot electron spin transport in the semiconductor and shows similartrends for both types of spin injector.