Microscopic model for the hidden Rashba effect in YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{6+x}$

TL;DR

This paper develops a microscopic model for the hidden Rashba effect in YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{6+x}$, revealing how local inversion symmetry breaking in CuO$_2$ layers leads to layer-specific spin textures with a predicted spin-splitting of about 10 meV.

Contribution

The paper introduces a detailed three-orbital model explaining the microscopic origin of the Rashba effect in YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{6+x}$, linking orbital structure to spin-splitting.

Findings

Rashba spin-splitting magnitude is approximately 10 meV.

Hidden spin textures exist with opposite signs in each CuO$_2$ layer.

Microscopic orbital analysis explains the origin of Rashba splitting.

Abstract

Each unit cell in YBa$_2$Cu$_3$O$_{6+x}$ contains a pair of two-dimensional CuO$_2$ layers. While the crystal structure is globally inversion symmetric, the individual layers are not. This leads, necessarily, to a nonvanishing Rashba spin-orbit coupling (SOC) in the CuO$_2$ layers, with opposite signs of the coupling constant in each layer. These so-called Rashba bilayers generate hidden spin textures, with a vansishing net spin at each $k$-point in the Brillouin zone, but nonvanishing spin textures in each layer separately. Here, we trace the microscopic origin of the Rashba splitting through the orbital structure of the CuO$_2$ conduction bands, obtain a generic three-orbital model Hamiltonian, and show that the magnitude of the spin-splitting predicted by density functional theory is $\sim 10$~meV.