39 research outputs found
Resonant spin polarization and spin current in a two-dimensional electron gas
We study the spin polarization and its associated spin-Hall current due to
EDSR in disordered two-dimensional electron systems. We show that the disorder
induced damping of the resonant spin polarization can be strongly reduced by an
optimal field configuration that exploits the interference between Rashba and
Dresselhaus spin-orbit interaction. This leads to a striking enhancement of the
spin susceptibility while the spin-Hall current vanishes at the same time. We
give an interpretation of the spin current in geometrical terms which are
associated with the trajectories the polarization describes in spin space.Comment: (5 pages), updated references, corrected typo
Endstates in multichannel spinless p-wave superconducting wires
Multimode spinless p-wave superconducting wires with a width W much smaller
than the superconducting coherence length \xi are known to have multiple
low-energy subgap states localized near the wire's ends. Here we compare the
typical energies of such endstates for various terminations of the wire: A
superconducting wire coupled to a normal-metal stub, a weakly disordered
superconductor wire and a wire with smooth confinement. Depending on the
termination, we find that the energies of the subgap states can be higher or
lower than for the case of a rectangular wire with hard-wall boundaries.Comment: 10 pages, 7 figure
Andreev reflection from non-centrosymmetric superconductors and Majorana bound state generation in half-metallic ferromagnets
We study Andreev reflection at an interface between a half metal and a
superconductor with spin-orbit interaction. While the absence of minority
carriers in the half metal makes singlet Andreev reflection impossible, the
spin-orbit interaction gives rise to triplet Andreev reflection, i.e., the
reflection of a majority electron into a majority hole or vice versa. As an
application of our calculation, we consider a thin half metal film or wire
laterally attached to a superconducting contact. If the half metal is disorder
free, an excitation gap is opened that is proportional to the spin-orbit
interaction strength in the superconductor. For electrons with energy below
this gap a lateral half-metal--superconductor contact becomes a perfect triplet
Andreev reflector. We show that the system supports localized Majorana end
states in this limit.Comment: 14 pages, 3 figure
Mesoscopic fluctuations in the spin-electric susceptibility due to Rashba spin-orbit interaction
We investigate mesoscopic fluctuations in the spin polarization generated by
a static electric field and by Rashba spin-orbit interaction in a disordered 2D
electron gas. In a diagrammatic approach we find that the out-of-plane
polarization -- while being zero for self-averaging systems -- exhibits large
sample-to-sample fluctuations which are shown to be well within experimental
reach. We evaluate the disorder-averaged variance of the susceptibility and
find its dependence on magnetic field, spin-orbit interaction, dephasing, and
chemical potential difference.Comment: 4 pages, 4 figure
Dynamic spin-Hall effect and driven spin helix for linear spin-orbit interactions
We derive boundary conditions for the electrically induced spin accumulation
in a finite, disordered 2D semiconductor channel. While for DC electric fields
these boundary conditions select spatially constant spin profiles equivalent to
a vanishing spin-Hall effect, we show that an in-plane ac electric field
results in a non-zero ac spin-Hall effect, i.e., it generates a spatially
non-uniform out-of-plane polarization even for linear intrinsic spin-orbit
interactions. Analyzing different geometries in [001] and [110]-grown quantum
wells, we find that although this out-of-plane polarization is typically
confined to within a few spin-orbit lengths from the channel edges, it is also
possible to generate spatially oscillating spin profiles which extend over the
whole channel. The latter is due to the excitation of a driven spin-helix mode
in the transverse direction of the channel. We show that while finite
frequencies suppress this mode, it can be amplified by a magnetic field tuned
to resonance with the frequency of the electric field. In this case, finite
size effects at equal strengths of Rashba- and Dresselhaus SOI lead to an
enhancement of the magnitude of this helix mode. We comment on the relation
between spin currents and boundary conditions.Comment: 10 pages, 5 figures, added references, corrected typos, extended
section V, VI
Geometric phases in semiconductor spin qubits: Manipulations and decoherence
We describe the effect of geometric phases induced by either classical or
quantum electric fields acting on single electron spins in quantum dots in the
presence of spin-orbit coupling. On one hand, applied electric fields can be
used to control the geometric phases, which allows performing quantum coherent
spin manipulations without using high-frequency magnetic fields. On the other
hand, fluctuating fields induce random geometric phases that lead to spin
relaxation and dephasing, thus limiting the use of such spins as qubits. We
estimate the decay rates due to piezoelectric phonons and conduction electrons
in the circuit, both representing dominant electric noise sources with
characteristically differing power spectra.Comment: 17 pages, 8 figures, published versio
Probability distribution of Majorana end-state energies in disordered wires
One-dimensional topological superconductors harbor Majorana bound states at
their ends. For superconducting wires of finite length L, these Majorana states
combine into fermionic excitations with an energy that is
exponentially small in L. Weak disorder leaves the energy splitting
exponentially small, but affects its typical value and causes large
sample-to-sample fluctuations. We show that the probability distribution of
is log normal in the limit of large L, whereas the distribution of
the lowest-lying bulk energy level has an algebraic tail at small
. Our findings have implications for the speed at which a
topological quantum computer can be operated.Comment: 4 pages, 2 figure
Spin Accumulation in Diffusive Conductors with Rashba and Dresselhaus Spin-Orbit Interaction
We calculate the electrically induced spin accumulation in diffusive systems
due to both Rashba (with strength and Dresselhaus (with strength
spin-orbit interaction. Using a diffusion equation approach we find
that magnetoelectric effects disappear and that there is thus no spin
accumulation when both interactions have the same strength, .
In thermodynamically large systems, the finite spin accumulation predicted by
Chaplik, Entin and Magarill, [Physica E {\bf 13}, 744 (2002)] and by Trushin
and Schliemann [Phys. Rev. B {\bf 75}, 155323 (2007)] is recovered an
infinitesimally small distance away from the singular point .
We show however that the singularity is broadened and that the suppression of
spin accumulation becomes physically relevant (i) in finite-sized systems of
size , (ii) in the presence of a cubic Dresselhaus interaction of strength
, or (iii) for finite frequency measurements. We obtain the parametric
range over which the magnetoelectric effect is suppressed in these three
instances as (i) , (ii), and (iii) |\alpha|-|\beta| \lesssiM
\sqrt{\omega/m p_{\rm F}\ell} with the elastic mean free path and
the Fermi momentum. We attribute the absence of spin accumulation
close to to the underlying U (1) symmetry. We illustrate and
confirm our predictions numerically
Detecting Current Noise with a Josephson Junction in the Macroscopic Quantum Tunneling Regime
We discuss the use of a hysteretic Josephson junction to detect current
fluctuations with frequencies below the plasma frequency of the junction. These
adiabatic fluctuations are probed by switching measurements observing the
noise-affected average rate of macroscopic quantum tunneling of the detector
junction out of its zero-voltage state. In a proposed experimental scheme,
frequencies of the noise are limited by an on-chip filtering circuit. The third
cumulant of current fluctuations at the detector is related to an asymmetry of
the switching rates.Comment: 26 pages, 10 figures. To appear in Journal of Low Temperature Physics
in the proceedings of the ULTI conference organized in Lammi, Finland (2006
Measurement of Rashba and Dresselhaus spin-orbit magnetic fields
Spin-orbit coupling is a manifestation of special relativity. In the
reference frame of a moving electron, electric fields transform into magnetic
fields, which interact with the electron spin and lift the degeneracy of
spin-up and spin-down states. In solid-state systems, the resulting spin-orbit
fields are referred to as Dresselhaus or Rashba fields, depending on whether
the electric fields originate from bulk or structure inversion asymmetry,
respectively. Yet, it remains a challenge to determine the absolute value of
both contributions in a single sample. Here we show that both fields can be
measured by optically monitoring the angular dependence of the electrons' spin
precession on their direction of movement with respect to the crystal lattice.
Furthermore, we demonstrate spin resonance induced by the spin-orbit fields. We
apply our method to GaAs/InGaAs quantum-well electrons, but it can be used
universally to characterise spin-orbit interactions in semiconductors,
facilitating the design of spintronic devices