We investigate half-metallicity in [001] stacked (CrAs)n/(GaAs)n heterostructures with n≤3 by means of a combined many-body and electronic structure calculation. Interface states in the presence of strong electronic correlations are discussed for the case n=1. For n=2,3 our results indicate that the minority spin half-metallic gap is suppressed by local correlations at finite temperatures, and continuously shrinks upon increasing the heterostructure period. Although around room temperature the magnetization of the heterostructure deviates by only 2 from the ideal integer value, finite temperature polarization at EF is reduced by at least 25. Below the Fermi level the minority spin highest valence states are found to localize more on the GaAs layers while lowest conduction states have a many-body origin. Our results, therefore, suggest that in these heterostructures holes and electrons remain separated among different layers.
@article{arxiv.1011.4390,
title = {Electronic correlations in short period (CrAs)$_n$/(GaAs)$_n$ ferromagnetic heterostructures},
author = {L. Chioncel and I. Leonov and H. Allmaier and F. Beiuseanu and E. Arrigoni and T. Jurcut and W. Pötz},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1011.4390},
year = {2015}
}