Direct band gap and strong Rashba effect in van der Waals heterostructures of InSe and Sb single layers

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Van der Waals heterostructures formed by stacking different types of 2D materials are attracting increasing attention due to new emergent physical properties such as interlayer excitons. Recently synthesized atomically thin indium selenide (InSe) and antimony (Sb) individually exhibit interesting electronic properties such as high electron mobility in the former and high hole mobility in the latter. In this work, we present a first-principles investigation on the stability and electronic properties of ultrathin bilayer heterostructures composed of InSe and Sb single layers. The calculated electronic band structures reveal a direct band gap semiconducting nature of the InSe/Sb heterostructures independent of stacking pattern. Taking spin–orbit coupling (SOC) into account, we find a large Rashba spin splitting at the bottom of conduction band, which originates from the atomic SOC with the symmetry breaking in the heterostructure. The strength of the Rashba spin splitting can be tuned by applying in-plane biaxial strain or an out-of-plane external electric field. The presence of large Rashba spin splitting together with a suitable band gap in InSe/Sb bilayer heterostructures make them promising candidates for spin field-effect transistor and optoelectronic device applications.