Ferromagnetism in Cr-doped GaN: A First Principles Calculation

Otherwise antiferromagnetic chromium is shown to couple ferromagnetically when doped into GaN irrespective of whether the host is a crystal or a cluster. The results on the doped clusters and crystals are obtained from density functional theory based molecular orbital theory and linearized muffin tin orbital tight binding supercell band structure method respectively. The calculated half metallic behavior of Cr-doped GaN crystal combined with the observed room temperature Curie point make it an ideal candidate for spintronics applications.