Spin-orbit effects in nanowire-based wurtzite semiconductor quantum dots

TL;DR

This paper investigates how Dresselhaus spin-orbit interaction affects electronic states and spin relaxation in wurtzite quantum dots, extending previous models and analyzing material-specific properties like g-factor and relaxation rates.

Contribution

It extends analytic solutions for cylindrical quantum dots to wurtzite structures and analyzes spin textures, g-factors, and relaxation rates considering Dresselhaus effects.

Findings

Spin texture and g-factor scale with an effective spin-orbit coupling strength.

Transverse piezoelectric potential dominates spin relaxation.

InAs quantum dots exhibit specific spin relaxation characteristics.

Abstract

We study the effect of the Dresselhaus spin-orbit interaction on the electronic states and spin relaxation rates of cylindrical quantum dots defined on quantum wires having wurtzite lattice structure. The linear and cubic contributions of the bulk Dresselhaus spin-orbit coupling are taken into account, along with the influence of a weak external magnetic field. The previously found analytic solution for the electronic states of cylindrical quantum dots with zincblende lattice structures with Rashba interaction is extended to the case of quantum dots with wurtzite lattices. For the electronic states in InAs dots, we determine the spin texture and the effective g-factor, which shows a scaling collapse when plotted as a function of an effective renormalized dot-size dependent spin-orbit coupling strength. The acoustic-phonon-induced spin relaxation rate is calculated and the transverse piezoelectric potential is shown to be the dominant one.