Full-zone analysis of relativistic spin splitting at band anticrossings: The case of zinc-blende semiconductors

We show that the band spin splitting caused by spin-orbit interaction in crystal structures with no inversion symmetry is strongly influenced by band anticrossing. The splitting is always enhanced for one of the anticrossing bands and suppressed for the other. There are two limiting cases. In the first, the spin splitting is completely suppressed for one of the bands and doubled for the other. In the second, the absolute value of the splitting is markedly enhanced for both bands approaching the magnitude of the hybridization gap. We demonstrate these effects in zinc-blende semiconductors with the help of first-principles GW calculations.