Hole doping induced half-metallic itinerant ferromagnetism and giant magnetoresistance in CrI3 monolayer

Highlights: • The magnetoresistance over 10⁶% is achieved via hole doping in 1L-CrI₃ by NEGF. • Hole doping renders 1L-CrI₃ half-metallic and nearly 100% spin-polarization. • Hole doping significantly enhances ferromagnetic stability and Curie temperature. The exploit of magnetic devices with high magnetoresistance is vital for the development of magnetic sensing and data storage technologies. Here, using density functional calculations combined with Monte Carlo simulations, we explore the magnetic properties and spin-dependent transport of CrI₃ monolayer under an electrostatic hole doping. Extraordinarily, the magnetoresistance can be controlled over 10⁶% within a certain doping density range. The hole doping can render CrI₃ monolayer half-metallic and nearly 100% spin-polarization at Fermi energy level can be achieved. Moreover, the hole doping can significantly enhance the stability of itinerant ferromagnetism. The Heisenberg exchange parameters can be significantly improved and meanwhile, the Curie temperature can be boosted to room temperature via a doping density of 8.49 × 10¹⁴ cm⁻². This study reveals that the carrier doping engineering can enable two-dimensional CrI₃ as a remarkable material for developing practical and high-performance spintronic nanodevices.