Orbital and spin order in oxide two-dimensional electron gases
Abstract
We describe a variational theory of multi-band two-dimensional electron gases that captures the interplay between electrostatic confining potentials, orbital-dependent interlayer electronic hopping and electron-electron interactions, and apply it to the d-band two-dimensional electron gases that form near perovskite oxide surfaces and heterojunctions. These multi-band two-dimensional electron gases are prone to the formation of Coulomb-interaction-driven orbitally-ordered nematic ground-states. We find that as the electron density is lowered and interaction effects strengthen, spontaneous orbital order occurs first, followed by spin order. We compare our results with known properties of single-component two-dimensional electron gas systems and comment on closely related physics in semiconductor quantum wells and van der Waals heterostructures.
Keywords
Cite
@article{arxiv.1608.03625,
title = {Orbital and spin order in oxide two-dimensional electron gases},
author = {John R. Tolsma and Marco Polini and Allan H. MacDonald},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1608.03625},
year = {2017}
}
Comments
15+1 pages, 5 figures