Resonant Spin Splitting in III-V Semiconductors

Abstract

We present first-principles studies of the zero field spin splitting of energy bands in typical III-V semiconductors. Our calculations reveal that the strain induces linear-k spin splitting of the conduction band in the Γ point, which is linear in strain, and determine the magnitude of the so-called acoustic phonon constant that characterizes the magnitude of the spin splitting. In addition, we show that optical phonons lead to spin-flip processes and we present quantitative results for the spin-phonon deformation potentials in GaAs. Most importantly, the calculations show that the linear-k spin splitting can be resonantly enhanced when bands cross in a particular point of the Brillouin zone. This resonant enhancement of the bulk inversion asymmetry coupling constant by more than one order of magnitude was observed in both valence and conduction bands and can be steered by the application of the external stress. This allows tailoring of the spin relaxation and spin precession of conduction electrons in nanostructures to a much larger extent than was hitherto assumed.