Influence of N doping on the Rashba coefficient, semiconductor-metal transition, and electron effective mass in InSb1−xNx nanowires : Ten-band k∙p model

Abstract

The electronic structures of InSb1−xNx nanowires are investigated using the ten-band k·p method. It is found that nitrogen increases the Rashba coefficient of the nanowires dramatically. For thick nanowires, the Rashba coefficient may increase by more than 20 times. The semiconductor-metal transition occurs more easily in InSb1−xNx nanowires than in InSb nanowires. The electronic structure of InSb1−xNx nanowires is very different from that of the bulk material. For fixed x the bulk material is a semimetal, while the nanowires are metal-like. In InSb1−xNx bulk material and thick nanowires, an interesting decrease of electron effective mass is observed near k=0 which is induced by the nitrogen, but this phenomenon disappears in thin nanowires.