Tremendous spin-splitting effects in open boron nitride nanotubes: application to nanoscale spintronic devices

Our calculations demonstrate that the intrinsic magnetism of boron nitride nanotubes (BNNTs) can be induced by their open ends, and the resulting magnetic moment is sensitive to the chirality of BNNTs. It is found that BNNTs, a pure sp-electron system, present a tremendous spin-splitting larger than 1 eV and that B-rich-ended and N-rich-ended BNNTs exhibit "conjugate", spin-polarized, deep-gap states. Tremendous spin-splitting effects combined with considerable local spin-polarizations at the open ends make BNNTs significant for applications of nanoscale spintronics such as spin-polarized electron emitters.