Lateral spin injection in germanium nanowires.

Electrical injection of spin-polarized electrons into a semiconductor, large spin diffusion length, and an integration friendly platform are desirable ingredients for spin-based devices. Here we demonstrate lateral spin injection and detection in germanium nanowires, by using ferromagnetic metal contacts and tunnel barriers for contact resistance engineering. Using data measured from over 80 samples, we map out the contact resistance window for which lateral spin transport is observed, manifestly showing the conductivity matching required for spin injection. Our analysis, based on the spin diffusion theory, indicates that the spin diffusion length is larger than 100 mum in germanium nanowires at 4.2 K.