Intrinsic spin Hall effect in noncubic crystals

TL;DR

This paper investigates how the intrinsic spin Hall effect varies with crystal symmetry and experimental geometry, providing methods to distinguish it from other effects in noncubic crystals.

Contribution

It introduces a detailed analysis of the spin Hall effect's dependence on crystal symmetry and proposes experimental geometries to isolate it from other phenomena.

Findings

The spin Hall effect's dependence on crystal symmetry is characterized.

Specific geometries can unambiguously distinguish the spin Hall effect.

The Hall voltage due to spin polarization is quantitatively computed.

Abstract

We study the dependence of the intrinsic spin Hall effect on the crystal symmetry and geometry of experiment. The spin current is obtained and the Hall voltage caused by the polarization of the electron spins is computed. The unique dependence of the effect on the crystal symmetry permits the choice of geometry in which the spin Hall effect can be unambiguously distinguished from the effects due to the orbital motion of charge carriers and due to the magnetic field generated by the transport current.