Rashba spin-orbit coupling is a quintessential spin interaction appearing in virtually any electronic heterostructure. Its paradigmatic spin texture in the momentum space forms a tangential vector field. Using first-principles investigations, we demonstrate that in twisted homobilayers and heteromultilayers, the Rashba spin texture can be predominantly radial, parallel to the momentum. Specifically, we study four experimentally relevant structures: twisted bilayer graphene (Gr), twisted bilayer ${\mathrm{WSe}}_2$, and twisted multilayers ${\mathrm{WSe}}_2/\mathrm{Gr}/{\mathrm{WSe}}_2$ and ${\mathrm{WSe}}_2/\mathrm{Gr}/\mathrm{Gr}/{\mathrm{WSe}}_2$. We show that the Rashba spin texture in such structures can be controlled by an electric field, allowing to tune it from radial to tangential. Such spin-orbit engineering should be useful for designing spin-charge conversion and spin-orbit torque schemes, as well as for controlling correlated phases and superconductivity in van der Waals materials.

Close

PrevNext

View figure in article

• Electronic structure
• Rashba coupling
• Spin-orbit coupling
• Spintronics
• Graphene
• Transition metal dichalcogenides
• Twisted heterostructures
• Two-dimensional electron system
• van der Waals systems
• Density functional theory