Intrinsic Spin Hall Effect Induced by Quantum Phase Transition in HgCdTe Quantum Wells
Mesoscale and Nanoscale Physics
2009-11-13 v1 Other Condensed Matter
Abstract
Spin Hall effect can be induced both by the extrinsic impurity scattering and by the intrinsic spin-orbit coupling in the electronic structure. The HgTe/CdTe quantum well has a quantum phase transition where the electronic structure changes from normal to inverted. We show that the intrinsic spin Hall effect of the conduction band vanishes on the normal side, while it is finite on the inverted side. This difference gives a direct mechanism to experimentally distinguish the intrinsic spin Hall effect from the extrinsic one.
Cite
@article{arxiv.0711.1900,
title = {Intrinsic Spin Hall Effect Induced by Quantum Phase Transition in HgCdTe Quantum Wells},
author = {W. Yang and Kai Chang and S. C. Zhang},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:0711.1900},
year = {2009}
}
Comments
4 pages, 4 figures