Dynamics of 2D electron wave packets with different initial spin polarization in 2D structures with spin-orbit coupling

Abstract

The effect of splitting and zitterbewegung of 2D-electrons wave packets in the presence of Rashba spin-orbit coupling has been investigated. It is shown that nonstandard dynamics of wave packets occurs in the systems where the complete system of eigenfunctions is formed by states with different chirality. The time evolution of wave packets depends on the initial electron spin orientation. It is established that the oscillations of packet centers decay with time. Similar effects were studied by us previously for packets with initial spin orientation perpendicular to the 2D electron gas plane.