The large Faraday rotations of Mn-containing diluted magnetic semiconductors have led to their consideration for use in magneto-optical isolators. With such applications in mind, we have examined the magneto-optical properties of Hg1-xMnxTe (x=0.26, 0.31, and 0.36). The samples are polished plates cut from single-crystal boules. The compositions were chosen to have their band edges in the vicinity of wavelengths of interest for fiber optical communications, 1.3 and 1.55 μm. Faraday rotation at 295, 77, and 1.7 K, as well as the absorption coefficient at 295 K, have been measured for these alloys and the data compared with the theoretical predictions. The measured rotations at the wavelengths of interest here are about 100-fold larger than those of other high-rotation paramagnetic materials, such as Tb3Al5O10 and various rare-earth glasses. However, the specific rotations available in reasonable fields (say, 3000 Oe) are about tenfold lower than those reported for Bi-doped ferrimagnetic garnets.
