A demonstration of 2D hole gases in GeSn/Ge heterostructures with a mobility as high as 20 000 cm2 V-1 s-1 is given. Both the Shubnikov-de Haas oscillations and integer quantum Hall effect are observed, indicating high sample quality. The Rashba spin-orbit coupling (SOC) is investigated via magneto-transport. Further, a transition from weak localization to weak anti-localization is observed, which shows the tunability of the SOC strength by gating. The magneto-transport data are fitted to the Hikami-Larkin-Nagaoka formula. The phase-coherence and spin-relaxation times, as well as spin-splitting energy and Rashba coefficient of the k-cubic term, are extracted. The analysis reveals that the effects of strain and confinement potential at a high fraction of Sn suppress the Rashba SOC caused by the GeSn/Ge heterostructures.
Keywords: Rashba spin-orbit coupling; heterostructures; spintronics; weak anti-localization.
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