Spin-Hall effect in the generalized honeycomb lattice with Rashba spin-orbit interaction

We study the spin-Hall effect in a generalized honeycomb lattice, which is described by a tight-binding Hamiltonian including the Rashba spin-orbit coupling and inversion-symmetry breaking terms brought about by a uniaxial pressure. The calculated spin-Hall conductance displays a series of exact or approximate plateaus for isotropic or anisotropic hopping integral parameters, respectively. We show that these plateaus are a consequence of the various Fermi-surface topologies when tuning epsilon(F). For the isotropic case, a consistent two-band analysis, as well as a Berry-phase interpretation. are also given. (C) 2009 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) G2009CB929300 National Natural Science Foundation of China 60821061 60776061This work was supported by the National Basic Research Program of China (973 Program) grant No. G2009CB929300 and the National Natural Science Foundation of China under Grant Nos. 60821061 and 60776061.