Spin-dependent conductance in FM/quantum-dot/FM tunneling system

Abstract

We present a theoretical study of the spin-dependent conductance spectra in a FM/semiconductor quantum-dot (QD)/FM system. Both the Rashba spin-orbit (SO) coupling in the QD and spin-flip scattering caused by magnetic barrier impurities are taken into account. It is found that in the single-level QD system with parallel magnetic moments in the two FM leads, due to the interference between different tunneling paths through the spin-degenerate level, a dip or a narrow resonant peak can appear in the conductance spectra, which depends on the property of the spin-flip scattering. When the magnetizations of the two FM leads are noncollinear, the resonant peak can be transformed into a dip. The Rashba SO coupling manifests itself by a Rashba phase factor, which changes the phase information of every tunneling path and can greatly modulate the conductance. When the QD has multiple levels, the Rashba interlevel spin-flip effect appears, which changes the topological property of the structure. Its interplay with the Rashba phase can directly tune the coupling strengths between dot and leads, and can result in switching from resonance into antiresonance in the conductance spectra.