Spin-orbit energy state splitting in semiconductor cylindrical and spherical quantum dots

Abstract

We present a theoretical study of the spin-orbit interaction impact on electron energy states in small cylindrical and spherical quantum dots. The investigation is based on the effective one-electronic band Hamiltonian and the spin dependent boundary conditions. It has been demonstrated that the spin-orbit interaction can significantly modify the energy spectrum of InAs and InSb quantum dots. The splitting can provide a situation where only the lowest spin split energy states are bound in the dot. A reasonable agreement was found with data from more sophisticated theoretical models for the spherical quantum dots which is available in the literature.