Spin current and rectification in one-dimensional electronic systems

Bernd Braunecker, D. E. Feldman

Published 2006-10-30, updated 2007-04-02Version 2

Spin and charge currents can be generated by an ac voltage through a one-channel quantum wire with strong electron interactions in a static uniform magnetic field. In a certain range of low voltages, the spin current can grow as a negative power of the voltage bias as the voltage decreases. The spin current expressed in units of hbar/2 per second can become much larger than the charge current in units of the electron charge per second. The system requires neither spin-polarized particle injection nor time-dependent magnetic fields.