Effect of uniaxial stress on Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations in HgSe

Abstract

The Shubnikov-de Haas (SdH) effect was used to study the strain dependence of the energy-band structure in HgSe. The application of uniaxial stress decreased the SdH frequencies; the changes depended upon the magnetic field direction and the electron concentration. At zero stress the SdH frequency $F$ exhibits an anisotropy with respect to magnetic field direction which is characteristic of a warped Fermi surface ${F}_{1\overline{1}1}>{F}_{1\overline{1}0}>{F}_{001}$. Under application of stress of 1 kbar along the [110] crystallographic direction, the anisotropy is such that ${F}_{1\overline{1}0}>{F}_{1\overline{1}1}>{F}_{001}$. This stress-induced anisotropy is shown to be the result of the stress-induced ellipsoidal nature of the conduction band. The strain theory developed by Bir and Pikus explains the effect of uniaxial stress on the energy-band structure of HgSe and enables values of the shear-deformation-potential parameters to be determined: $b\ensuremath{\simeq}\ensuremath{-}1.4$ eV and $d\ensuremath{\simeq}\ensuremath{-}2.7$ eV.