Spin-dependent tunneling through a symmetric semiconductor barrier

Abstract

The problem of electron tunneling through a symmetric semiconductor barrier based on zinc-blende-structure material is studied. The k(3) Dresselhaus terms in the effective Hamiltonian of bulk semiconductor of the barrier are shown to result in a dependence of the tunneling transmission on the spin orientation. The difference of the transmission probabilities for opposite spin orientations can achieve several percents for the reasonable width of the barriers.