Origin of Rashba spin-splitting and strain tunability in ferroelectric bulk CsPbF$_3$

TL;DR

This study investigates the origin and strain tunability of Rashba spin-splitting in ferroelectric CsPbF$_3$, revealing large Rashba effects driven by spin-orbit coupling and strain, with implications for spintronics applications.

Contribution

The paper provides a first-principles analysis of Rashba spin-splitting in CsPbF$_3$, highlighting strain tunability and the dominance of Rashba over Dresselhaus effects in this ferroelectric material.

Findings

Large Rashba coefficient at conduction band minimum due to Pb-6p orbitals.

Rashba spin-splitting can be significantly tuned with uniaxial strain.

No out-of-plane spin component, indicating Rashba dominance.

Abstract

Spin-orbit coupling (SOC) in conjunction with broken inversion symmetry acts as a key ingredient for several intriguing quantum phenomena viz. persistent spin textures, topological surface states and Rashba-Dresselhaus (RD) effects. The coexistence of spontaneous polarization and the RD effect in ferroelectric materials enables the electrical control of spin degree of freedom. In light of this, we explore here the ferroelectric lead halide perovskite viz. CsPbF$_3$ as a potential candidate in the field of spintronics by employing state-of-the-art first-principles based methodologies viz. density functional theory (DFT) with semi-local and hybrid functional (HSE06) combined with spin-orbit coupling (SOC) and many-body perturbation theory (G$_0$W$_0$). For a deeper understanding of the observed spin-splitting, we have analyzed the spin textures within the combined framework of DFT and $\textbf{k.p}$ model Hamiltonian. The latter confirms that there is no out of plane spin component indicating that the Rashba splitting dominates over Dresselhaus splitting in this system. Owing to the presence of Pb-6$p$ orbital in conduction band, the large value of Rashba coefficient ($\alpha_R$) at conduction band minimum (CBm) is noticed in comparison to that of at the valence band maximum (VBM). Notably, we also observe that strength of Rashba spin-splitting can be substancially tuned on application of uniaxial strain ($\pm5\%$). This finding will further pave the path for perovskite-based spintronics devices.