Valley-polarized tunneling currents in bilayer graphene tunneling transistors

J. J. P. Thompson, D. J. Leech, Marcin Mucha-Kruczynski

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article

Abstract

We study theoretically the electron current across a monolayer graphene/hexagonal boron nitride/bilayer graphene tunneling junction in an external magnetic field perpendicular to the layers. We show that change in effective tunneling barrier width for electrons on different graphene layers of bilayer graphene, coupled with the fact that its Landau level wave functions are not equally distributed amongst the layers with a distribution that is reversed between the two valleys, lead to valley polarization of the tunneling current. We estimate that valley polarization ∼ 70% can be achieved in high quality devices at B=1T. Moreover, we demonstrate that strong valley polarization can be obtained both in the limit of strong-momentum-conserving tunneling and in lower quality devices where this constraint is lifted.
LanguageEnglish
Article number085420
JournalPhysical Review B
Volume99
Issue number8
DOIs
StatusPublished - 15 Feb 2019

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Electronic, Optical and Magnetic Materials
  • Condensed Matter Physics

Cite this

Valley-polarized tunneling currents in bilayer graphene tunneling transistors. / Thompson, J. J. P.; Leech, D. J.; Mucha-Kruczynski, Marcin.

In: Physical Review B, Vol. 99, No. 8, 085420, 15.02.2019.

Research output: Contribution to journal › Article

Thompson, JJP, Leech, DJ & Mucha-Kruczynski, M 2019, 'Valley-polarized tunneling currents in bilayer graphene tunneling transistors', Physical Review B, vol. 99, no. 8, 085420. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.99.085420
Thompson JJP, Leech DJ, Mucha-Kruczynski M. Valley-polarized tunneling currents in bilayer graphene tunneling transistors. Physical Review B. 2019 Feb 15;99(8). 085420. https://doi.org/10.1103/PhysRevB.99.085420
Thompson, J. J. P. ; Leech, D. J. ; Mucha-Kruczynski, Marcin. / Valley-polarized tunneling currents in bilayer graphene tunneling transistors. In: Physical Review B. 2019 ; Vol. 99, No. 8.
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  • BY13112

    @article{PhysRevB.99.085420, title = {Valley-polarized tunneling currents in bilayer graphene tunneling transistors}, author = {Thompson, J. J. P. and Leech, D. J. and Mucha-Kruczy\ifmmode \acute{n}\else \'{n}\fi{}ski, M.}, journal = {Phys. Rev. B}, volume = {99}, issue = {8}, pages = {085420}, numpages = {11}, year = {2019}, month = {Feb}, publisher = {American Physical Society}, doi = {10.1103/PhysRevB.99.085420}, url = {https://link.aps.org/doi/10.1103/PhysRevB.99.085420} }

    Accepted author manuscript, 1 MBLicence: Unspecified