Pressure effects on the spin–orbit interactions in low-dimensional quantum well systems

Donor binding energies and spin–orbit interactions (SOIs) are estimated in GaAs–Ga1−xAlxAs quantum well and quantum dot systems. The effect of the conduction band non-parabolicity on these energies is also estimated. In all the cases investigated, the maximum contribution by the non-parabolicity effect is about 5% for narrow well dimensions. It is also seen that the SOI is one order higher in a quantum dot system as compared to a quantum well case. In both cases, the spin–orbit splitting is four orders smaller than the donor binding energies. We observe that the Rashba and Dresslhaus SOIs are about the same order as the conventional spin–orbit contributions. We have also investigated the effect of pressure on the SOI energies and find appreciable enhancement in the quantum well case.