Control of the charge, spin, and heat currents in thermoelectric devices is an interesting research field that is currently experiencing a burst of activity. In this work, a new type of spin-current generator is proposed that consists of a single-molecule magnet sandwiched between a pair of nonmagnetic electrodes. By applying an external magnetic field, this tunneling junction can generate a 100% spin-polarized current via thermoelectric effects, and the flow direction and spin polarization can be changed by adjusting the gate voltage or magnetic field. Moreover, regardless of whether the external magnetic field exists, the thermoelectric current is always highly spin polarized and can be switched by using different gate voltage windows. This molecular electrical device can be realized with current technologies and may have practical use in spin caloritronics and quantum information processing.
Keywords: single-molecule magnet; spin injection; thermoelectric effect.
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