Theory of spin Hall effect: extension of the Drude model.

An extension of the Drude model is proposed that accounts for the spin and spin-orbit interaction of charge carriers. Spin currents appear due to the combined action of the external electric field, crystal field, and scattering of charge carriers. The expression for the spin Hall conductivity is derived for metals and semiconductors that is independent of the scattering mechanism. In cubic metals, the spin Hall conductivity sigma s and charge conductivity sigma c are related through sigma s=[2pi variant /(3mc2)]sigma2c with m being the bare electron mass. The theoretically computed value is in agreement with experiment.