2006/08/14 by Pei-Qing Jin, You‐Quan Li, You-Quan Li
Physics and Astronomy · #Magnetic properties of thin films #Physics of Superconductivity and Magnetism #Quantum and electron transport phenomena #cond-mat.mes-hall #cond-mat.str-el
paper · pdf · doi:10.1103/physrevb.77.155304
published as Phys. Rev. B 77, 155304 (2008) · RevTex, 4 pages, 2 figures
arxiv created 2006/08/14 · openalex publication_date 2008/04/03 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2016/06/24 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/28
Starting from a continuum constituted by charged tops, we formulate the classical counterpart of a previously obtained covariant continuitylike equation for the spin current. Such a formulism provides an intuitive picture to elucidate the nonconservation of the spin current and to interpret the condition for the emergence of an infinite spin relaxation time. It also facilitates the discussion on the spin precession in a one-dimensional quantum wire with the Dresselhaus and Rashba spin-orbit couplings. Furthermore, we derive the diffusion equations for both the charge and spin densities and find that they couple to each other due to the Zitterbewegung.