Spin-orbit scattering and the Kondo effect

Yigal Meir

Physics Department, University of California, Santa Barbara, California 93106

Ned S. Wingreen

NEC Research Institute, 4 Independence Way, Princeton, New Jersey 08540

The effects of spin-orbit scattering of conduction electrons in the Kondo regime are investigated theoretically. It is shown that due to time-reversal symmetry, spin-orbit scattering does not suppress the Kondo effect, even though it breaks spin-rotational symmetry, in full agreement with experiment. An orbital magnetic field, which breaks time-reversal symmetry, leads to an effective Zeeman splitting, which can be probed in transport measurements. It is shown that, similar to weak localization, this effect has anomalous magnetic-field and temperature dependence.

©1994 The American Physical Society.

PACS: 72.10.Fk 72.15.Qm 72.20.My 73.50.Jt

Full Text:

Published version: PDF (363 kB), or postscript (487 kB) (locally) or PDF directly from PRB (you may need a password for that)