Magnetically induced oscillations of the spin polarization in the Datta-Das geometry

Abstract

The control of intrinsic magnetic degrees of freedom is very important as it offers a practical means to manipulate and probe electron spin transport. Tunable spin-orbit effect in quantum wires can in principle serve as a means to achieve this goal. Here, we investigate within the scattering matrix approach the effect of an in-plane magnetic field on the conductance of the quantum wire in the Datta-Das geometry and show that the interplay of the spin-orbit interaction with the magnetic field provides enhanced control over the electron spin polarization. In particular, we predict a novel effect of magnetically induced oscillations of the electron spin in a certain range of magnetic field.

4 pages, 4 figures; typos corrected, references added