Optical conductance of a two-dimensional semiconductor in the presence of Rashba spin-orbit coupling and a periodic potential

Authors

T E. O'Brien, University of WollongongFollow
Chao Zhang, University of WollongongFollow

RIS ID

67543

Publication Details

O'Brien, T. E. & Zhang, C. (2012). Optical conductance of a two-dimensional semiconductor in the presence of Rashba spin-orbit coupling and a periodic potential. Modern Physics Letters B, 26 (26), 1-7.

Abstract

We investigate the optical conductivity of a two-dimensional semiconductor with Rashba spin-orbit coupling subject to an external sinusoidal potential. Using Fourier series, we obtain quantitative results on the band structure of this system. The periodic potential can be treated as a perturbation of the Rashba Hamiltonian, with the induced band gap at degeneracy point being linear with the potential strength. The optical conductance displays a number of interesting features, namely the presence of multiple tunable resonances that originate from a k-shift of band extrema.