The Zeeman, Spin-Orbit, and Quantum Spin-Hall Interactions in Anisotropic and Low-Dimensional Conductors

When an electron or hole is in a conduction band of a crystal, it can be very different from 2, depending upon the crystalline anisotropy and the direction of the applied magnetic induction ${bf B}$. In fact, it can even be 0! To demonstrate this quantitatively, the Dirac equation is extended for a relativistic electron or hole in an orthorhombically-anisotropic conduction band with effective masses $m_j$ for $j=1,2,3$ with geometric mean $m_g=(m_1m_2m_3)^{1/3}$. The appropriate Foldy-Wouthuysen transformations are extended to evaluate the non-relativistic Hamiltonian to $O({rm m}c^2)^{-4}$, where ${rm m}c^2$ is the particles Einstein rest energy. For ${bf B}||hat{bf e}_{mu}$, the Zeeman $g_{mu}$ factor is $2{rm m}sqrt{m_{mu}}/m_g^{3/2} + O({rm m}c^2)^{-2}$. While propagating in a two-dimensional (2D) conduction band with $m_3gg m_1,m_2$, $g_{||}<<2$, consistent with recent measurements of the temperature $T$ dependence of the parallel upper critical induction $B_{c2,||}(T)$ in superconducting monolayer NbSe$_2$ and in twisted bilayer graphene. While a particle is in its conduction band of an atomically thin one-dimensional metallic chain along $hat{bf e}_{mu}$, $g<<2$ for all ${bf B}={bf abla}times{bf A}$ directions and vanishingly small for ${bf B}||hat{bf e}_{mu}$. The quantum spin Hall Hamiltonian for 2D metals with $m_1=m_2=m_{||}$ is $K[{bf E}times({bf p}-q{bf A})]_{perp}sigma_{perp}+O({rm m}c^2)^{-4}$, where ${bf E}$ and ${bf p}-q{bf A}$ are the planar electric field and gauge-invariant momentum, $q=mp|e|$ is the particles charge, $sigma_{perp}$ is the Pauli matrix normal to the layer, $K=pmmu_B/(2m_{||}c^2)$, and $mu_B$ is the Bohr magneton.